Gather ’round, children, while we read the amazing motion that President Donald Trump filed in his suit against The Wall Street Journal over their story about Trump’s coziness with convicted dead sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. The gist of it is that even though Trump only filed his lawsuit against the paper 10 days before demanding this, he needs to depose media mogul Rupert Murdoch with a quickness, before Murdoch shuffles off this mortal coil. 

Generally, discovery in a federal case doesn’t start until the parties have a Rule 26(f) conference, where they must confer about discovery and create a proposed discovery plan. That conference doesn’t happen until after a defendant has filed an answer to the complaint, which hasn’t happened here. In fact, Trump didn’t oppose the Journal’s request to delay answering the complaint until Sept. 22, 2025, but then turned around and filed this thing. 

So, back to Murdoch. Is there any particular reason to believe that Murdoch will be dead before this case either hits the discovery stage or The Wall Street Journal caves like so many media companies before it? Well, per Trump’s filing, it’s because he is old, old, old. 

Here’s the rundown on walking corpse Murdoch. He fainted at breakfast a few months ago, he was hospitalized for COVID-19 in 2022, in the last five years he broke his back, had seizures, had pneumonia, atrial fibrillation, and a torn Achilles tendon. Yeah, those torn tendons are a literal killer for sure. Also, Rupert is 94 and lives in New York.

All of this, for Trump, adds up to justification to demand a deposition and production of documents months before he is entitled to it. Murdoch is either going to die or be too frail to go to Miami, where Trump filed this case. 

It’s not just that Murdoch is going to die. It’s also that he’s much more powerful and has a huge advantage over Trump. This is Trump in full beleaguered dual role: on the one hand, he’s the president, so how dare you! On the other hand, he’s just a small bean who is at an incredible disadvantage against the might of The Wall Street Journal:

Murdoch is able to defend himself because he has access to all the information and documents related to the below-defined malicious and defamatory Article, and the decision behind deciding to publish it. On the other hand, President Trump has very limited information related to the Article.

Besides being nonsense vis-a-vis the alleged power imbalance, this is also nonsense legally. Of course Murdoch knows more about what happened at The Wall Street Journal than Trump does. But that’s true in every lawsuit like this, not a reason to get a jumpstart on discovery before the other side has even answered the complaint.  

But wait, there’s more. According to Trump, it’s not just that he’s the underdog here. It’s also that this helps Murdoch:

Timing of the deposition benefits Murdoch. Because discovery has not yet begun, Murdoch has an advantage over President Trump to defend himself in his deposition. On the one hand, Murdoch has access to all the information related to the Article and the decision behind publishing it. On the other hand, President Trump has very limited information related to the Article and lacks the same access to information that Murdoch does.

Trump isn’t just demanding Murdoch sit for a deposition. He also wants a ton of documents turned over in discovery—again, not a thing that one gets to do 10 days after filing a lawsuit. According to Trump, however, it’s cool, because he’s not asking for much. Just all the documents about the article, any text messages or WhatsApp or Slack or any other digital messages about the article, and a log of all calls Murdoch made or received about the article.

This is literally the opposite of how it works. No defendant is clamoring to be deposed long before they’ve answered the complaint or agreed on the scope of discovery. No one is going to give up all these documents so Trump can go on a fishing expedition. Rather, this is Trump trying to wring information out of Murdoch before having to do the heavy lifting of actually pursuing this lawsuit rather than hoping for a multimillion dollar payout. 

Trump also uses this time to reiterate all his grievances about the paper’s coverage of his ties with Epstein and his very unique theory of defamation. Trump says that because he called Murdoch to personally demand he kill the story because Trump said it was false and, per Trump, Murdoch said he would “take care of it,” that means that the Journal published the piece knowing it was fake: 

Because Defendants published the Article after President Trump spoke directly with Murdoch and advised him that the letter referenced in the Article was fake, Murdoch’s direct involvement further underscores Defendants’ actual malice and intent behind the decision to publish the false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements about President Trump identified in the Complaint.

This is not how defamation works. You don’t get to just say “well, I said it wasn’t true, so now it’s defamatory if you publish it” and win the day. Otherwise it would be near-impossible to prevail in a defamation suit against an inveterate liar like Trump. 

The lawyer behind this bit of sparkling prose is Alejandro Brito, who is Trump’s go-to guy for  frivolous suits against media companies. It would normally result in sanctions for him and consequences for his clients, but since those companies just keep caving, no harm done. 

Trump’s demand in the lawsuit is his usual inflated nonsense—The Wall Street Journal owes him $10 billion for defaming him. But let’s face it—what he’s really angling for is the standard bribe of $16 million or so, along with a tacit agreement that the Journal won’t say bad things about Trump ever again, or they’ll face another lawsuit. 

But maybe, just maybe, the Journal will be the mainstream media entity to stand on principle and keep fighting Trump. Never thought we’d have to cheer for the bodily and mental integrity of Rupert Murdoch, but we live here now.