Donald Trump in breach of £300,000 legal costs ruling after losing UK dossier case against former MI6 spy
Donald Trump is in breach of a British High Court order to pay £300,000 in legal costs to the former spy who compiled a salacious dossier alleging Russian interference in the 2016 US election.
Sky News can reveal Trump has failed to comply with the costs order and thus far ignored a formal offer to settle with Christopher Steele, the former MI6 agent who compiled the infamous document.
Trump was ordered to pay costs in February after the High Court threw out his attempt to sue Mr Steele’s company Orbis Business Intelligence.
The former president claimed the report, which included unsubstantiated allegations of bribery and that he used sex workers while on a trip to Moscow, contained inaccuracies and breached his rights under the Data Protection Act.
The judge, Mrs Justice Steyn, did not make any judgment on the allegations but ruled the claim was invalid because it was filed after the six-year limitation period. Trump was subsequently also denied leave to appeal.
On the judge’s order, Trump did pay £10,000 to the court as security against costs ahead of the hearing, which was transferred to Mr Steele in February.
In March, Orbis made a formal offer to settle using the civil court Part 36 procedure, but Trump’s lawyers have not responded.
“The fact is we were awarded a £300,000 initial cost order in February, which was confirmed when his right of appeal was turned down at the end of March. And so he’s been in breach of that order for two months now,” Mr Steele told Sky News.
“Cost is the key issue in all litigation, and particularly in what we call lawfare, which we think this is. It is an attempt to take vengeance against us or to keep us quiet,” he said.
Christopher Steele leaving court in February
Mr Steele, a former head of MI6’s Russia desk, was commissioned to produce the document by Trump’s political opponents including Hillary Clinton’s Democratic Party.
It collated what he says was a “running commentary” on the Russian view of Trump and the election campaign, drawn from multiple intelligence sources.
Much of the information in the dossier was unverified and Mr Steele says it was never intended for publication.
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Following the election it was leaked to the media by a conservative politician with whom it had been shared. Trump has repeatedly denied the allegations.
“We stand by the sources we were running and the work we did and the way we handled it,” Mr Steele said. “It’s important to underline that it wasn’t meant for publication. It was leaked by an American Republican who we’d entrusted with it without our permission or our knowledge, and we’ve been involved in litigation as a result ever since.”
The revelation that Trump is in breach of a UK court order comes after he became the first US president to be convicted of a felony. He was found guilty of charges relating to hush money paid to the adult film actress Stormy Daniels last week.
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He is appealing that verdict and faces three other live legal proceedings in the US in the build-up to November’s election.
Were he to be elected, it raises the prospect of his returning to the UK as president in defiance of a British court.
Mr Steele says he has no means of recouping his costs from UK assets owned by Trump, because the golf courses that bear his name in Scotland are held in trust structures.
If Trump does not settle, Mr Steele’s only option would be to seek repayment in the US, incurring further costs.
“We’re talking about perhaps the next president of the US here, who is running for office and claims to love and respect the UK, and in fact is treating our legal system with contempt,” he said.
“I think he’s trying to put off a lot of these legal cases and these fines and these costs until after what he thinks will be his re-election in November, in which case he will just tell us all to go and jump, basically.”
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Trump’s press secretary and his private office failed to respond to Sky News’ request for comment.
Following the initial judgment, a spokesman for the former president told the BBC he would “continue to fight for the truth and against falsehoods such as the ones promulgated by Steele and his cohorts”.
“The High Court in London has found that there was not even an attempt by Christopher Steele, or his group, to justify or try to prove, which they absolutely cannot, their false and defamatory allegations in the fake ‘dossier,” he added.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.
Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.
His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.
The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.
“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.
Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.
Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.
Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.
“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.
“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”
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Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.
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In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.
“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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Will Trump address parliament on UK state visit?
This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
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