President Donald Trump holds scissors to cut the ribbon during the opening ceremony for Trump International Golf Links near Aberdeen, Scotland, Tuesday, July 29, 2025 (AP Photo/Alastair Grant).
Not long after hearing from an attorney for Pulitzer Prize board members, a Florida judge rejected Donald Trump's request for a 150-day extension for discovery, remarking that the president "just has to follow the rules like the rest of us" because he chose to move forward with his defamation suit while in office.
In the lead-up to the case management hearing, the Pulitzer defendants complained that plaintiff Trump hasn't "produce[d] a single written response or document" relating to his tax returns, psychological records, or former special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election despite already having five additional months to comply with discovery in his defamation lawsuit.
The defendants' attorney Martin Reeder's frustration about "willy-nilly" discovery was apparent as soon as he addressed Senior 19th Judicial Circuit Judge Robert Pegg during a Zoom hearing Tuesday morning in Okeechobee County.
"It's a defamation case, and it's a defamation case where the plaintiff is a public official, and because he is a public official," Reeder said, "[Trump] must prove actual malice by clear and convincing evidence."
"Plaintiffs are usually unable to accomplish that, and that's why most public official cases that are defamation cases end in summary judgment for the defendants, and here the defendants are entitled to a fair opportunity to conduct all the discovery that they need for their motion," he explained.
Blasting Trump's ask for a new October discovery response deadline, the attorney noted the request was filed on June 12 — "the day the parties had previously agreed that this discovery would be due from the plaintiff to the defendants," a date that was moved because Trump "argued that he's very busy with his presidential duties and would not have adequate time."
Reeder said Pegg should reject, then and there, Trump's demand for delay "just based on the idea" that he's president. After all, the defendants have so far "produced about 125,000 pages of documents."
"That is prejudicial to the defendant," the attorney said, emphasizing that Trump had previously insisted on moving forward with the case while in office, arguing that point all the way up to Florida's Supreme Court in summer 2025.
Pegg, remarking that "this is one of the most unusual cases, certainly, I've ever seen," indicated he would deny the motion for an extension of time.
"Obviously the plaintiff being the president of the United States is quite unique in itself, but he, as a plaintiff, chose to file a suit when he did while he was sitting in office, and he, I'm sure, recognized that there's going to be discovery requests, and has obligations in a lawsuit even if he is the president of the United States," the judge said. "So, yeah, because he elected to do that, I mean, he just has to follow the rules like the rest of us. There's no exemption just because he's a president, even though obviously got important duties to do."
Trump attorney R. Quincy Bird responded by correcting the judge, noting that the lawsuit was filed after Trump's first term but before he was inaugurated a second time.
"You're right," Pegg said. "You're absolutely right about that."
Trump first filed the lawsuit in 2022, after the board released a statement rebuffing his demands to rescind 2018 prizes for The New York Times and The Washington Post.
The board's allegedly defamatory statement cited "two independent reviews" of the Times' and Post's reporting to conclude that the prizes "stand," as "no" aspects of the award-winning articles on Mueller's Russia probe were "discredited."
Still, Trump has repeatedly argued against pausing the lawsuit while he's in office. The Pulitzer defendants have argued that he's had enough time to file new lawsuits, make discovery demands of his own, and conduct depositions of defendants.
During the hearing, Bird even pinpointed November 2027 for trial, envisioning a 15-day proceeding during Trump's presidency.
Bird suggested it was hypocritical for the defendants to complain about dragged-out discovery when the board had previously ground the case to a halt.
"They have a clear strategy of trying to drag out their own production for over a year to challenge jurisdiction. We've got extremely limited jurisdictional discovery, and their jurisdictional challenge failed. They filed a motion to dismiss that held up merits discovery there for another year. That failed as well. They moved to stay the case. That failed also. All the while, they are dragging out their own production," Bird fumed.
"Unlike how our client is often cast in the media and by some other courts around the country, absolutely, President Trump, the plaintiff here, respects the court, this process," he added.
The judge indicated there would be another hearing during the week of July 6 with more arguments to resolve "all" discovery deadlines.