Stable Genius Trump Hit With Massive Fine in Steele Dossier Lawsuit
Donald Trump must have gotten tired of winning, because he just added a six-figure legal bill to his ever-growing pile of lawsuit fines.
A London judge has ordered Trump to pay £300,000 (or $382,000) in legal fees for Orbis Business Intelligence, court documents released Thursday showed. Orbis is a consulting firm founded by former MI6 officer Christopher Steele.
During his career in British intelligence, Steele ran the Russia desk. In 2016, he compiled a dossier that alleged Trump and members of his inner circle had been “compromised” by Russia’s security service. Documents in the dossier, which have not been verified, claimed Russia had been grooming Trump for collaboration for years. Two memos also said that Trump had participated in “sex parties” in St. Petersburg and received “golden showers” from sex workers in Moscow.
Trump sued Orbis, claiming he had “suffered personal and reputational damage and distress,” particularly from the sex-related claims. He has denied all the allegations in the dossier, which was leaked to and then published by Buzzfeed in 2017.
But presiding Judge Karen Steyn threw the case out last month, saying it was “bound to fail.” And now, she has ordered Trump to reimburse Orbis for the company’s legal fees incurred during the daylong hearing.
That $382,000 bill, however, is just a drop in the bucket of Trump’s growing legal fees. The former president owes more than $466 million for committing real estate–related fraud in New York. He was initially fined $354 million, but interest adds an additional $112,000 per day.
Trump also owes a total of $88.3 million to writer E. Jean Carroll—$5 million for sexually abusing and defaming her and $83.3 million for defaming her a separate time. He owes $400,000 to The New York Times and has racked up thousands more in fines and gag order violations during his myriad lawsuits.
What’s more, Trump’s former personal attorney Rudy Giuliani says he still hasn’t been paid for legal services. Giuliani estimated that Trump owes him about $2 million in total.