01/09/2018

Groups Defend Publication of West Wing Tell-All

A cease-and-desist request has associations invoking the First Amendment

A reporter’s portrait of life inside the West Wing in 2017 prompted a cease-and-desist request from the White House last week, in turn prompting multiple associations to defend their members’ work as writers, publishers, and booksellers.

Last Thursday, a law firm representing President Donald Trump sent a letter to reporter Michael Wolff and his publisher, Henry Holt, requesting that Wolff’s book "Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House" be withheld from release. The letter, written in response to an excerpt from the book published early last week on the website of New York magazine, makes multiple accusations against Wolff and Henry Holt, including libel against Trump and inducement of breach of contract against former White House Chief Strategist Stephen Bannon.

“Mr. Trump hereby demands that you immediately cease and desist from any further publication, release or dissemination of the book, the article or any excerpts or summaries of either of them, to any person or entity, and that you issue a full and complete retraction and apology to my client as to all statements made about him in the book and article that lack competent evidentiary support,” reads the letter in part from Charles J. Harder of Harder Mirell and Abrams.

Please click here to read the complete article from Associations Now.