Jessica Denson, a staffer who worked on Donald Trump’s presidential election campaign, has been ordered to pay $25,000 to the campaign. Why? Denson (who specifically helped Trump’s Hispanic outreach) filed an anti-discrimination lawsuit against the campaign, as reported by Buzzfeed News.
How did this start? According to her court filings, Denson worked as a national phone bank administrator as well as the director of Hispanic engagement for the Trump campaign. While her lawsuit does not involve Trump specifically, it involves some serious allegations against campaign officials. In the New York County Supreme Court, she sued the campaign on grounds of cyberbullying, discrimination, and hostility.
Denson sought $25 million in damages. So how did she end up owing Trump’s campaign $25,000? An iron-clad non-disclosure agreement.
Trump’s decision to use NDAs with people in subordinate positions likely speaks to his desire to silence those who could share information that would impact his image. While not precisely the same situation, it’s pretty impossible to consider this case without thinking about adult-film star Stormy Daniels.
To review: Michael Cohen (Trump’s former attorney) had allegedly been directed by Trump to give Daniels $130,000 to essentially keep her quiet about her alleged past involvement with Trump. (This would be, of course, illegal.) While Cohen has been all over the map on these allegations (he’s gone from denying any knowledge to acknowledging the payments but claiming they weren’t illegal), Trump initially denied it all, though more recently he followed suit and claimed the payments wouldn’t have been illegal regardless.
In Denson’s case, the Trump campaign claims that Denson’s lawsuit violates the non-disclosure agreement she signed. The NDA prohibited her from sharing confidential information, competing with the campaign, violating its intellectual property rights, or disparaging it. So when she sued them, they took that as a violation of their agreement.
The Trump campaign worked with the American Arbitration Association to make its case against Denson. Notably, this happened behind closed doors. She was ordered to pay the $25,000 in October. The award amount wasn’t made public until late November, when her lawyers specified it in her court filings.
What’s next? This long legal battle continues. Denson is challenging the award in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, arguing that it doesn’t line up with a court order that was filed over the summer, which clarified that her allegations of discrimination and harassment were not covered by her NDA, and thus were fair game for a lawsuit. The next hearing is scheduled for the end of January 2019.
