(CN) — A defamation lawsuit against President Donald Trump can proceed despite his objections, a federal judge ruled, as five Black and Latino men who were wrongfully convicted and later exonerated in the “Central Park Five” rape cases say Trump knowingly made false statements about them during a September presidential debate.
“We are gratified by the Court’s ruling and thorough analysis and look forward to discovery, trial and the ultimate vindication of these five fine men,” said Shanin Specter, an attorney representing the men.
The suit, filed in October in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, accuses Trump of making several inaccurate and defamatory statements about the five men surrounding the 1989 attack and rape of a white woman jogging in New York City’s Central Park.
The five men, then boys ages 14 to 16, say they were coerced by police into giving false confessions during interrogation and recanted within weeks. All five pleaded not guilty, were convicted the following year and later exonerated in 2002 after another man’s confession and new DNA evidence cleared their names.
When the five men — now in their 50s — were mentioned during the Sept. 10 presidential debate between Trump and then-Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris, Trump made several inaccurate statements about the case’s circumstances.
“They admitted — they said, they pled guilty,” Trump said during the debate. “And I said, well, if they pled guilty, they badly hurt a person, killed a person. And if they pled guilty — then they pled, ‘We’re not guilty.’”
In reality, none of the five men ever pleaded guilty to the Central Park attack — all have professed their innocence since recanting their confessions in 1989. Additionally, no victim in the attack was killed. As such, the five men sued Trump, asserting that he damaged their reputations by knowingly making false statements about them on national television.
Trump presented several arguments in federal court in an attempt to quash the suit, but on Thursday, U.S. District Judge Wendy Beetlestone ruled all lack merit.
First, Trump argued that his statement during the debate presented opinions, not facts. Beetlestone disagreed, noting that the five men reasonably read Trump’s comments to assert three objectively false statements — that the men pleaded guilty, that they badly hurt someone and that they killed someone.
Next, Trump presented a “substantial-truth defense,” arguing that the gist of his comment is true. To support this defense, Trump noted in court documents that four of the five men confessed on videotape to their involvement in the Central Park attack during police interrogation.
However, Beetlestone refuted Trump’s equivalence of a guilty plea and a confession. A guilty plea typically involves an in-person hearing to confirm the plea’s validity, she wrote, and usually cannot be rescinded. In comparison, the Barack Obama appointee added, a confession during interrogation is inconclusive and is not even always admissible in court, depending on whether evidence exists of police coercion.
Additionally, Beetlestone said, the five men were deemed innocent decades ago, further invalidating Trump’s defense.
“Their name had been cleared for over twenty years, so Defendant cannot argue that stating that they pleaded guilty to crimes is substantially true, when the truth is that Plaintiffs are not guilty at all of those crimes,” Beetlestone wrote in her opinion.
Finally, Trump claimed the five men failed to sufficiently assert a false light claim, in which the men say Trump knew his comment was untrue. Again, Beetlestone disagreed.
To support their false light claim, the five men noted several public statements made by Trump in the years leading up to the September 2024 debate.
These included a 2013 tweet reviewing a documentary detailing the men’s experiences surrounding the investigation, their not-guilty pleas and exonerations, and a 2014 New York Daily News editorial written by Trump regarding the men’s civil settlement with New York City.
Additionally, Beetlestone noted, Trump’s counsel admitted at oral argument that Trump is closely familiar with the five men’s not guilty pleas, convictions and exonerations. As such, Beetlestone wrote, the men’s false light claim can proceed.
“This baseless lawsuit is yet another unfounded and meritless attack against President Trump,” said Karin Sweigart, Trump’s personal counsel. “It exemplifies the very kind of meritless legal action Pennsylvania’s anti-SLAPP law aims to prevent — shielding free speech from politically motivated abuse.”
A White House spokesperson declined to comment on the litigation.
Trump has been tied to the Central Park Five case nearly since its inception, long before his foray into politics. Less than two weeks after the assault in Central Park, Trump — then known as a real estate magnate — purchased a full-page ad in several New York City newspapers, alluding to the five men as guilty and demanding an unsparing response.
“Send a message loud and clear to those who would murder our citizens and terrorize New York — BRING BACK THE DEATH PENALTY AND BRING BACK OUR POLICE!” the ad read.
Harris referenced the advertisement during the September 2024 presidential debate, lambasting Trump for “calling for the execution of five young Black and Latino boys who were innocent” and prompting Trump’s inaccurate statements at the core of the lawsuit.