Melania Trump Sheds Defamation Suit From Author Michael Wolff

A federal judge dismissed a defamation suit from the author and journalist Michael Wolff against First Lady Melania Trump, taking issue with the suit’s “inappropriate level of tactical gamesmanship.”

Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York declined to rule on the merits of the “garden-variety dispute over alleged defamation,” instead deciding that a federal court in New York isn’t “bound” to hear them since Trump had already sued Wolff in Florida.

“The outcome is simple,” Vyskocil said May 22. “The Court will not be conscripted to oversee an abusively presented spat and so declines to reach the merits here.”

Wolff sued Trump after she threatened to sue him for $1 billion in damages over “certain statements” he had publicly made linking her to convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, she said in court papers, insisting he retract the statements and apologize to her. His case was removed from the New York state court system last December.

Though the “basic issue” is whether Wolff’s public statements about the First Lady were defamatory, the judge said she must first decide whether she “can hear this case at all.”

Because Trump already sued Wolff in Florida under that state’s law, Wolff may not “short-circuit that process by preemptively litigating his defenses and counterclaims here, under New York law,” the judge said.

Trump has sufficiently shown she resides in Florida, “where she has her primary residence, spends most of her time, votes in federal elections, and maintains her driver’s license,” Vyskocil said.

Miller Korzenik Rayman LLP represents Wolff. Brito PLLC and DLA Piper US LLP represent Trump.

The case is Wolff v. Trump, No. 1:25-cv-10752, 5/22/26.