Judge Dismisses Trump's Lawsuit Against the Wall Street Journal With Prejudice, Reuters Reports

A U.S. judge dismissed President Donald Trump's lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal with prejudice on Saturday, Reuters reported, citing a court filing. A dismissal with prejudice is final in form: unlike a dismissal without prejudice, it does not leave the plaintiff free to bring the same claim again.

The lawsuit grew out of the Journal's reporting last July describing a letter bearing Trump's name in a leather-bound album of birthday messages compiled in 2003 for Jeffrey Epstein's 50th birthday, reporting read this run shows. Trump sued the Journal and its publisher seeking $10 billion, denying he wrote the letter and calling the report false and defamatory.

The case had already been dismissed once. U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles earlier dismissed the complaint without prejudice, finding that Trump had not plausibly alleged the Journal published the article with actual malice - the standard a public figure must meet in a defamation case - and gave him until April 27 to file an amended complaint, according to that earlier reporting. Saturday's dismissal with prejudice, as Reuters reported it, closes the door that the earlier ruling had left open.