The lawsuit had emerged from the inaccurate on-air comments of a top anchor about a sexual abuse case involving Trump.
ABC News has settled a defamation suit filed by President-elect Donald Trump over an inaccurate claim made by the United States-based network’s anchor, agreeing to pay $15m, according to court documents.
The lawsuit originated from statements on air by the anchor George Stephanopoulos, saying that Trump had been “found liable for raping” the writer E Jean Carroll.
The network and the anchor also agreed to make public apologies for the comments in a subsequent live This Week interview with Representative Nancy Mace, according to documents that were filed on Saturday.
Under the terms of the settlement, ABC News will be required to make a $15m payment to a fund for “ a presidential foundation and museum” for Trump. The broadcaster is also set to pay an extra $1m in lawyer fees, the documents said.
Trump filed his suit against ABC and Stephanopoulos in federal court in Miami several days after the network broadcast the segment in which the veteran morning show anchor and current This Week host repeatedly misstated the verdicts in Carroll’s two civil lawsuits against Trump.
Trump had already been found liable for sexual abuse — a different offense than rape under New York law — in a 2023 case brought by the writer.
In the first of the lawsuits to reach trial, Trump was found liable last year for sexually abusing and defaming Carroll. A jury then awarded her $5m.
We have determined that in January, at a second trial in federal court in Manhattan, Trump was found liable on further defamation claims and ordered to pay Carroll $83.3m.
Trump is appealing each verdict.
Carroll, a former advice columnist, publicly revealed her allegation that Trump raped her in the mid-1990s in Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury Manhattan department store across the street from Trump Tower, in a 2019 memoir after they crossed paths at an entrance.
The case was settled a day after Judge Lisette M Reid ordered both Trump and Stephanopoulos to give depositions.
Should the settlement be approved and be final, it will add to a string of legal victories Trump has enjoyed since he was elected president on November 5.
Last month a US appeals court dismissed charges against trump in connection with his alleged mishandling of classified documents after he left the White House.
US Special Counsel Jack Smith also halted a separate federal prosecution over Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election outcome, although Trump is still charged with racketeering on the same matter in a Georgia case.
A judge has also stayed sentencing indefinitely in Trump’s conviction in May in the hush money case, the only criminal charges against him to go to trial.
