Judge Rules In Favor Of Publisher In Mary Trump Tell-All Book Debacle

US President Donald Trump boards Air Force One prior to departure from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, February 14, 2020, as he travels to Mar-a-lago in Florida for the weekend. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo by S... US President Donald Trump boards Air Force One prior to departure from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, February 14, 2020, as he travels to Mar-a-lago in Florida for the weekend. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images) MORE LESS
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

The publisher of Mary Trump’s tell-all book can go ahead for now with publication plans following a ruling by a New York appellate judge on Wednesday, which reversed a lower court’s decision to pause the publication of a much-anticipated account by President Trump’s niece.

The book, “Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man,” according to court papers filed by publisher Simon & Schuster and obtained by The New York Times, has allegedly already been printed and sold tens of thousands of copies. It is also listed as a best seller on Amazon.

The account is anticipated to reveal how Mary Trump contributed to a report from The Times on the Trump family’s tax schemes. 

The text was central to a legal dispute about whether, by writing the book, Trump’s niece had violated a two decades old confidentiality agreement that she signed after a struggle over the will of Donald Trump’s father Fred Trump Sr.

In his decision, Judge Alan Scheinkman ruled that Simon & Schuster was not a party to the confidentiality agreement and therefore could not be bound by it in spite of a Tuesday ruling that placed a temporary restraining order on the book’s publication. While the restraining order was lifted on Simon & Schuster, the court left the temporary restraining order in place for Mary Trump until a hearing scheduled for July 10.

“Unlike Ms. Trump,” Scheinkman wrote, “S&S has not agreed to surrender or relinquish any of its First Amendment rights.” The publishers had earlier argued they were unaware of Mary Trump’s signing of a confidentiality agreement.

Simon & Schuster quickly celebrated the decision as a win in a statement on Wednesday night, calling the book a work of “real interest and importance” that “fully deserves to be published for the benefit of the American public.”

“As all know, there are well-established precedents against prior restraint and pre-publication injunctions, and we remain confident that the preliminary injunction will be denied,” the publishing company added.

While Scheinkman declined to rule on the question of whether Mary Trump had violated the agreement, he said it it was reasonable for a prominent family to agree to keep “intimate family matters” away from the public.

He also said, however, that the 20-year-old agreement to protect the Trump family’s privacy may have been altered by the fact that Donald Trump had become the president during that time.

 The book is scheduled to be released at the end of July.

Latest News

Notable Replies

  1. Sooo…where is my popcorn?

  2. Good thing I just had a case of beer delivered. This could be fun!

  3. Hopefully this is just an appetizer for his tax returns.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

167 more replies

Participants

Avatar for paulw Avatar for jw1 Avatar for mattinpa Avatar for eggrollian Avatar for cervantes Avatar for alyoshakaramazov1 Avatar for jinnj Avatar for misterneutron Avatar for jacksonhts Avatar for Anarchy_Bunker Avatar for lizzymom Avatar for castor_troy Avatar for tiowally Avatar for dannydorko Avatar for grack Avatar for rhs1963 Avatar for ekcambridge Avatar for bwillator Avatar for justruss Avatar for dougsanders Avatar for rascal_crone Avatar for kovie Avatar for Paracelsus Avatar for JR_in_Mass

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: