Newsweek writer and author Nina Burleigh is hopping mad at Britain’s Daily Telegraph for running an apology to first lady Melania Trump.
As the Washington Examiner reported Friday, the severe anti-Trumper is furious that the paper apologized and paid damages to the first lady over an article that alleged Mrs. Trump had a “fearsome presence,” became a successful model because her husband’s connections and cried tears of sorrow when President Donald Trump was elected president in 2016.
U.S. first lady Melania Trump arrives to attend a commemoration ceremony for Armistice Day, 100 years after the end of the First World War at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France, Nov. 11, 2018. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier/Pool
Her attorneys say it’s made her “an international poster girl for ‘fake news.'”
In a letter to The Telegraph obtained by the Examiner, Burleigh’s lawyers demand the apology be taken down from the website and threaten to sue for damages. (RELATED: New Memoir Alleges Melania Trump A Force To Be Reckoned With In White House)
“[Telegraph Media Group] had nothing to apologise for, and both the fact that it did so, and the particularly lurid way it abandoned the article, have turned Ms. Burleigh into an international poster girl for ‘fake news,'” Burleigh’s attorneys claim.
The reporter is sticking to her story.
“The overall effect of the apology is to make the reasonable reader believe that Ms. Burleigh is an incompetent and unprofessional journalist, who made multiple unsupported allegations or deliberate lies without sources or without checking them,” the letter to The Telegraph editor Chris Evans reads.
Besides being known for her chronic dislike of the president, Burleigh is remembered for saying something more supportive of President Bill Clinton in 1998: “I’d be happy to give him a blow job just to thank him for keeping abortion legal.”
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton speaks during Aretha Franklin’s funeral at Greater Grace Temple on Aug. 31, 2018 in Detroit, Michigan. (ANGELA WEISS/AFP/Getty Images)
Burleigh’s article in question was published by The Telegraph on Jan. 19, entitled “The Mystery of Melania.” It was based on a book from Burleigh that had just been published in October: “Golden Handcuffs: The Secret History of Trump’s Women.” (RELATED: Liberals Speculate Melania Trump Hates Her Husband)
The Telegraph’s apology claimed that the article contained “a number of false statements which we accept should not have been published,” including the references to the first lady’s father and her career advancement. For good measure, The Telegraph also said the claim it had made about Trump crying on election night was also “false.”