Former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields said on Sunday that she could file a defamation suit against Donald J. Trump's campaign for the way she was treated after she accused campaign manager Corey Lewandowski of assault.
April 17, 2016

Former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields said on Sunday that she could file a defamation suit against Donald J. Trump's campaign for the way she was treated after she accused campaign manager Corey Lewandowski of assault.

During an interview on CNN's Reliable Sources, Fields suggested that State Attorney Dave Aronberg had dropped the charges against Lewandowski because his family had ties to Trump.

And Fields said that she would not have filed the charges in the first place if she had gotten an apology from Lewandowski.

"I stayed quiet because I didn't want this to become a story," she insisted. "The only reason I went to the police was Donald Trump was saying I was making it up. He was questioning the bruises. Katrina Pierson, the national spokesperson for Donald Trump, was going on TV and saying, 'Well if this really happened, why didn't she go to the police?'"

"I felt they forced me to," Fields added. "They were saying I put makeup on my arm, that they weren't real bruises. I had to bring someone objective into the situation to take down the facts."

When CNN host Brian Stelter asked the former Breitbart reporter about a possible defamation suit, she revealed that she was "not going to rule it out."

"Do I think they defamed me? Absolutely," she remarked. "Corey said that he hadn't met me, that he had never touched me. We know that that's a lie... I think they were trying to defame me. And it shows malice."

As a result of the incident, Fields said that she quit her job because of a lack of support from Breitbart, and that she was forced to move out of her home after Fox News accidentally published her addresss.

"I think the Trump campaign tried to paint me as a villain, but there's a lot of smart people in America that see through this and see that they defamed me," she noted. "In the conservative movement, it's also becoming apparent that there are people who are providing favorable coverage to Trump in order to maintain access and kind of helping Trump. And there are others who realize the truth of Trump."

"I've heard Trump supporters say you should apologize to Corey Lewandowski," Stelter observed. "For dragging him through this. What do you say to them?"

"It's laughable," Fields replied. "He grabbed me, he denied it, he defamed me. And if anything, he should provide an apology."

Can you help us out?

For nearly 20 years we have been exposing Washington lies and untangling media deceit, but now Facebook is drowning us in an ocean of right wing lies. Please give a one-time or recurring donation, or buy a year's subscription for an ad-free experience. Thank you.

Discussion

We welcome relevant, respectful comments. Any comments that are sexist or in any other way deemed hateful by our staff will be deleted and constitute grounds for a ban from posting on the site. Please refer to our Terms of Service for information on our posting policy.
Mastodon