Trump is suing CBS over an edited 60 Minutes interview with Harris

The former president Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against CBS today, accusing the network of “election and voter interference.”

“This action alleges CBS’s partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference through malicious, misleading and substantial distortions of news calculated to (a) confuse, deceive and mislead the public and (b) attempt tip the balance in favor of the Democratic Party as the heated 2024 presidential election — which President Trump is leading — draws to a close,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.

The trial, which was the first reported by Fox News, is over an interview Vice President Kamala Harris did with “60 Minutes.”

“CBS and its 60 Minutes producers intentionally misled the public by airing and posting a misleadingly edited carefully edited interview and transcript while opting to release other portions online. Such manipulative editing sought to mislead the electorate about Kamala’s lack of skill, intelligence and attractiveness,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.

In the lawsuit, which was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Trump is seeking at least $10 billion in damages and a jury trial.

CBS did not immediately respond to an email request for comment. On Oct. 20, “60 Minutes” posted a statement saying Trump’s allegations of deceptive editing by the news network were “false.”

The statement addressed the difference between the clip of Harris played on “Face the Nation,” another CBS show, and her response on “60 Minutes” to a question about Israel.

“’60 Minutes’ provided an excerpt from our interview with ‘Face the Nation,’ which used a longer section of her response than the one on ’60 Minutes.’ Same question. Same answer. But a different part of the answer,” 60 Minutes said. statement.

After that statement, Trump lawyer Edward Andrew Paltzik sent a letter to CBS asking the network to release the full transcript of Harris’ “60 Minutes” interview, Fox News reported. The full transcript was not released.

The lawsuit accuses CBS of a longstanding bias against Republicans.

“This is not the first time that CBS has engaged in unethical and illegal conduct through 60 Minutes to attempt to sabotage a Republican presidential candidate,” the lawsuit states. “CBS’s misconduct here evokes the Dan Rather ’60 Minutes’ scandal of 2004, in which Rather presented four falsified documents as authentic in an attempt to impeach President George W. Bush’s integrity regarding his service in the Air National Guard in Texas in 1972-1973. “