The Lawsuit That Changed Donald Trump’s Life
A chance encounter with lawyer Roy Cohn in the 1970s proved to be fateful for future president Donald Trump, writes James D. Zirin in his new book “Plaintiff in Chief: A Portrait of Donald Trump in 3,500 Lawsuits.”
In an excerpt from the book at Slate, Zirin writes that Trump and his father, Fred, were dealing with clashes with the Open Housing Center, a local fair-housing group that was working with the Justice Department, as well as the New York City Human Rights Commission, which asked the government to investigate racial discrimination in the Trumps’ neighborhood housing. All the lawyers Trump approached advised him to settle.
But when Trump discussed the problem with Cohn, the lawyer told him, “Tell them to go to hell, and fight the thing in court.” Trump had found his lawyer and his approach to defending against all kinds of charges: go on the attack, bashing your enemies.
