Donald Trump’s presidential campaign has been ordered by an arbitrator to pay $1.3 million in legal fees to Omarosa Manigault Newman, the former “Apprentice” star who worked as a White House adviser, in a dispute stemming from a nondisclosure agreement.
The Trump campaign filed a complaint against Newman with the American Arbitration Association in 2018, claiming that her tell-all-book — “Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House” — violated her nondisclosure agreement.
Newman’s lawyer, John Phillips, hailed the decision announced Tuesday as the “largest known attorney fee award against a Political Campaign or President we can find.”
“Hopefully [it] will send a message that weaponized litigation will not be tolerated and empower other lawyers to stand up and fight for the whistleblower and vocal critic against the oppressive machine,” Phillips said in a statement to website Law and Crime.
Arbitrator T. Andrew Brown granted Newman’s summary judgment motion to throw out the case in September 2021, saying the NDA was “unreasonable” and “unenforceable.”
But Newman’s legal team filed a number of motions seeking payment of legal fees, while Trump’s campaign filed a series of counterclaims.
Brown in his Tuesday ruling said Newman was “defending herself in a claim which was extensively litigated for more than three years, against an opponent who undoubtedly commanded far greater resources.”
He awarded Newman the “sum of $1,293,568.75 for attorney’s fees and $17,304.73 for costs, for a total award of $1,310,873.48.”
The 45th president had no immediate comment on the ruling.
