President Donald Trump said he played a role in First Lady Melania Trump’s recent legal fight with Hunter Biden after their feud grew more heated on Thursday, Aug. 14.
During an interview with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, Trump was asked about Melania’s choice to threaten Biden with a $1 billion lawsuit. The lawsuit followed Biden’s comments claiming that Jeffrey Epstein introduced Donald and Melania, a story the Trumps strongly deny.
“Was that the right thing to do?” Kilmeade asked Trump on The Brian Kilmeade Show, pointing out the huge dollar amount.
Trump, 79, said that he encouraged Melania, 55, to move forward. “I told her, ‘Let’s go ahead and do it,’” he said. “I let her use my lawyers,” adding that he’s “done pretty well” in his own lawsuits.
On Wednesday, Aug. 12, Fox News reported that Melania’s lawyer had sent a letter to Biden demanding he retract statements he made in an interview with Andrew Callaghan. In that interview, posted to YouTube, Biden repeated a claim made by a biographer that Epstein was the one who introduced Melania to Trump.
Melania has given a different story in her 2024 memoir Melania, where she wrote that she first met Trump in 1998 at the Kit Kat Klub in New York City, while he was on a date with another woman.
“These false, disparaging, defamatory, and inflammatory statements are extremely salacious and have been widely disseminated,” Melania’s attorney Alejandro Brito wrote in the letter, which was obtained by Fox News. He added that the interview was spread by many outlets and influencers to “tens of millions of people worldwide.”
Melania and her lawyer demanded that Biden, 55, take back his statements and apologize. If not, they warned, she would sue him for $1 billion, saying his claims caused “financial and reputational harm.”
The letter gave Biden until Aug. 7 to respond. Instead of apologizing, Biden appeared on Callaghan’s show again Thursday morning and said, “F— that. That’s not gonna happen.”
Biden argued that the lawsuit threat was just “a distraction.” He added, “I also think they’re bullies… if they want to sit down for a deposition and clarify the nature of the relationship between Jeffrey Epstein… I’m more than happy to provide them the platform to be able to do it.”
Melania’s legal team also blamed biographer Michael Wolff as the original source of Biden’s claim, calling him a “serial fabulist.” The Daily Beast deleted a story based on Wolff’s claims after Melania’s lawyers threatened legal action.
Political analyst James Carville also recently apologized after making similar remarks on his podcast.
A spokesperson for the first lady, Nick Clemens, told PEOPLE that Melania’s lawyers are pushing for “immediate retractions and apologies” from anyone spreading “malicious, defamatory falsehoods.”
Speaking again with Kilmeade, Trump said: “Jeffrey Epstein had nothing to do with Melania. I did meet through another person, but it wasn’t Jeffrey Epstein.”
