ABC to Pay $15 Million to Settle a Defamation Suit Brought by Trump

ABC News agreed on Saturday to give $15 million to President-elect Donald J.Trump’s future presidential foundation and museum to settle a defamation lawsuit filed by Mr.

Trump this spring concerning on-air statements made by the network’s star anchor George Stephanopoulos.Under the terms of a settlement agreement filed in Federal District Court in Miami, ABC News and Mr.Stephanopoulos said they would soon publish a statement saying they “regret” the remarks that the anchor made about Mr.

Trump during a televised interview in March.ABC News, which is owned by the Walt Disney Company, will pay Mr.Trump an additional $1 million for his legal fees.The outcome of the lawsuit marks an unusual victory for Mr.

Trump in his ongoing legal campaign against national news organizations.Several of his previous attempts to sue media outlets for defamation, including lawsuits against CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post, ended in defeat.“We are pleased that the parties have reached an agreement to dismiss the lawsuit on the terms in the court filing,” a spokeswoman for ABC News said on Saturday.Mr.

Trump’s lawyers and a spokesman for his transition did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.During the interview that prompted the lawsuit, Mr.Stephanopoulos asked Representative Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina, who has spoken publicly about being raped as a teenager, why she had continued to support Mr.

Trump after he was found liable for rape in a civil case in Manhattan last year.In that case, a federal jury found Mr.Trump liable for sexually abusing and defaming the writer E.

Jean Carroll, but it did not find him liable for rape.Still, the judge who oversaw the proceeding later clarified that because of New York’s narrow legal definition of rape, the jury’s verdict did not mean that Ms.

Carroll had “failed to prove that Mr.Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’”Mr.

Trump ultimately...