CBS is asking for a dismissal of the $10 billion lawsuit that President-elect Donald Trump filed against the network in October.
In a filing on Friday, the network argued that Trump's suit was filed in a court that had no "personal jurisdiction" over CBS. Trump's team filed in the conservative-friendly Northern District of Texas. As CBS' operations are based in New York City, they argued that the Texas court was not the appropriate venue.
Trump sued the network in October after CBS ran different clips of a Kamala Harris interview on "60 Minutes" and "Face The Nation." Trump's attorneys alleged that the "60 Minutes" interview that was edited for clarity "damaged President Trump’s fundraising and support values by several billions of dollars, particularly in Texas."
CBS countered in their Friday filing that they did not "purposely direct its conduct at Texas specifically when producing, editing, and broadcasting the interview of Vice President Harris that aired on '60 Minutes,'" adding that there is no "affiliation between Texas, the substance of the challenged interview, or the harm felt by [Trump], a Florida resident."
"If this district has personal jurisdiction on the facts alleged, so too does every district court in the country," they wrote. "That is not the law."
CBS went on to ask for a change of venue if the case were not dismissed outright. The network argued that the Southern District of New York — a district court that has a storied history with the president-elect — would make a much more sensible venue.
