Trump Challenges if Rupert Murdoch Truly 'Controls' WSJ

Trump Questions Murdoch’s Control Over the Wall Street Journal

President Donald Trump, 79, made a surprising comment on Tuesday regarding the ownership of the Wall Street Journal. He speculated whether Rupert Murdoch, the 94-year-old owner of the newspaper, actually controls it. This came just a day after Trump demanded that Murdoch be deposed in a $10 billion lawsuit he is bringing against the paper.

“I would have assumed that Rupert Murdoch controls it,” Trump said during a flight on Air Force One while heading out of the U.K. “Maybe he does, maybe he doesn’t. They are talking to us about doing something, but we’ll see what happens.”

This lawsuit stems from a recent report by the Wall Street Journal about a letter Trump allegedly sent to the disgraced billionaire Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday in 2003. The letter reportedly included a sexually suggestive image that Trump illustrated. Trump has called the letter “fake” and claimed that the paper defamed him.

On Monday, Trump’s attorney asked a court to compel Murdoch to sit for a deposition within the next two weeks. The request argued that Murdoch’s recent health issues could prevent him from speaking about his role in approving the story. The motion also highlighted Trump’s direct appeals to Murdoch over the story, which he revealed earlier this month on Truth Social. Trump claimed that Murdoch told him he would “take care of it,” but instead, Murdoch seemed to reject the request.

Despite this, Trump claimed on Tuesday that the Wall Street Journal has sought to settle the case. “They want to settle it,” he said. However, a spokesperson for the Journal did not respond to a request for comment. Dow Jones, the parent company of the Journal, has stated that it has “full confidence in the rigor and accuracy” of its Epstein piece and will “vigorously defend it in court.”

If the paper settles, it would join a growing list of media companies, universities, and law firms that have tried to placate Trump’s anger through financial means. For example, Paramount recently settled Trump’s $20 billion lawsuit against the company over a 60 Minutes episode for $16 million. This move was heavily criticized as a capitulation to the president, and the Federal Communications Commission approved the merger with David Ellison’s Skydance Media last week. Similarly, Disney settled a lawsuit with Trump for $16 million over an ABC News interview last year.

Columbia University agreed to pay $200 million to the government to end its regulatory assault, and Harvard University is considering doing the same, according to The New York Times. Multiple law firms, which Trump targeted after representing some of his political enemies, have also signed deals with the government to do pro bono work related to the Trump administration’s priorities.

Murdoch has previously given the Journal carte blanche to report on what it deems newsworthy—even if it involves him. The paper reported extensively on Murdoch’s battle with his children last year to amend his family trust, which he lost. He also allowed the paper leeway to report on the blood-testing company Theranos despite founder Elizabeth Holmes’ direct appeal to him, a Theranos investor, over the coverage. Holmes is currently serving an 11-year prison sentence.

Even as Murdoch’s other U.S. media companies, Fox News and the New York Post, provide often fawning coverage of Trump, the Journal’s opinion side has been allowed to crawl under Trump’s skin. Trump has complained about the paper’s editorial board’s frequent opposition to his policies, voicing his opposition in front of Murdoch directly during Murdoch’s Oval Office visit in February.

“I’ve been right over The Wall Street Journal a number of times,” Trump said during the visit. “I don’t agree with him on some things.”

Still, some Journal reports have angered the Australian media tycoon. Murdoch personally criticized editor Emma Tucker over a Journal profile of media reporter (and frequent Murdoch reporter) Oliver Darcy’s newsletter Status, according to former Daily Beast editor-at-large Lachlan Cartwright’s Breaker Media.