The co-manager of President Donald Trump’s triumphant 2024 campaign has filed a defamation lawsuit against the Daily Beast. The legal action, filed on Monday, revolves around reports concerning the compensation he received for his role in the campaign.
Chris LaCivita, on whose behalf the lawsuit was submitted, contests the claims by the online publication. Initial reports alleged that he had been paid $22 million over a two-year span, a figure later adjusted to $19.2 million. LaCivita asserts that these figures falsely suggested he was excessively profiting from his campaign work and prioritizing personal gains over the campaign’s success.
In response, the Daily Beast has stood firm with its reporting. Declaring the lawsuit as baseless, they interpret it as an overt effort to intimidate the publication and suppress the independent press.
Renowned celebrity attorney Mark Geragos is representing LaCivita in the legal proceedings, which have been lodged in the U.S. District Court located in Richmond, Virginia. Axios first broke news of this filing.
This case is part and parcel of a broader pattern of assertive actions taken by Trump and his associates against the media. Notable instances include Trump initiating a $20 billion lawsuit against CBS News related to the editing of a “60 Minutes” interview with his 2024 adversary, Kamala Harris, and taking legal action against the Des Moines Register due to inaccuracies in an Iowa election poll. In a separate case, ABC News opted for a settlement with Trump stemming from a mistaken claim that he had been found civilly liable for the rape of writer E. Jean Carroll.
Within his lawsuit, LaCivita argues that most of the funds he received from Trump were disbursed to his firm, Advancing Strategies LLC, primarily for the purchase of media advertisements. He contends that the inaccurate portrayal by the stories inflicted damage on his reputation and obstructed his firm’s capacity to attract new clients.
The Daily Beast, in correspondence with Geragos last month, indicated their intention to request the presence of Trump and several key aides during the discovery process. Attorney Neil Rosenhouse, representing the publication, rebuffed the assertion that LaCivita’s business suffered any damage.
He stated, “The Beast’s reporting that the LLC earned millions of dollars by successfully managing President Trump’s campaign is not defamatory; it is, in fact, quite the opposite.”