On Tuesday, federal Judge Paul G. Gardephe cancelled a nondisclosure agreement (NDA) that a woman named Jessica Denson signed when she worked with the Trump campaign during the 2016 election cycle. Denson had previously said that she suffered discriminatory treatment and sexual harassment while working on the campaign, and the Trump campaign subsequently challenged Denson, temporarily winning a financial settlement over her supposed NDA violation. Last year, a New York state court threw out the $50,000 from Denson that the Trump campaign had been granted.
An effort by Trump's campaign to silence Jessica Denson, a former campaign worker who claimed she was the target of abusive treatment and sexual harassment by another member of Trump's campaign, has been effectively voided by a federal court judge.https://t.co/Nc55jEo4Xt
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 31, 2021
Gardephe wrote that the agreement that Denson signed, which extended indefinitely into the future, was “invalid and unenforceable,” adding that “[it] is difficult if not impossible for Denson or another campaign employee to know whether any speech might be covered by one of the broad categories of restricted information.” In a previous court filing, Denson stated that she was “subject to a hostile work environment and experienced sex discrimination, and… after she complained, high-ranking persons in the campaign retaliated against her.”
As summarized by The New York Times, Denson had “sued on behalf of herself and other Trump campaign aides who had been forced to sign confidentiality agreements, asking that they all be invalidated as too broad and illegal in New York because they lasted indefinitely.” For now, Gardephe only voided Denson’s agreement, but her legal team — including attorneys David K. Bowles, Joe Slaughter, and John Langford — is apparently planning to pursue getting all connected nondisclosure agreements voided by the court.
As Bowles put it this week:
‘The campaign has been using this to beat up campaign workers for years. Our position is now these things are illegal.’
This case is not the only one in which Trump has recently suffered a defeat. On Tuesday, a New York appeals court green-lit a defamation lawsuit against Trump from ex-Apprentice contestant Summer Zervos, who brought her case after the ex-president derogatorily dismissed her story of suffering sexual assault that he perpetrated. The case was previously in limbo over whether or not a state court could subject a sitting president to its proceedings, but Trump is a private citizen now. Although it’s unclear whether she will be successful in her efforts, Zervos is seeking a deposition from Trump as part of the proceedings.
E. Jean Carroll, who’s also said that she suffered sexual assault that Trump perpetrated, has filed a defamation lawsuit against the former president under similar circumstances, and she is also seeking a Trump deposition.
