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Leadership

Donald Trump Has Been Involved in a Huge Number of Lawsuits

Lucinda Shen
By
Lucinda Shen
Lucinda Shen
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Lucinda Shen
By
Lucinda Shen
Lucinda Shen
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June 2, 2016, 12:01 PM ET
Donald Trump Holds Press Conference At Trump Tower
Photograph by Spencer Platt—Getty Images

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has developed a reputation for being a big fan of the lawsuit.

In fact, since he announced his intention to run for president just under a year ago, the candidate has had an average of five days between each new lawsuit filing, according to an analysis by USA Today. Trump and his businesses have had about 70 lawsuits filed by or against them since the summer of last year, with a 50/50 split between Trump as plaintiff and defendant.

At the same time, 50 civil lawsuits, filed prior to Trump’s presidential run, are still open, the most famous of which is the class action lawsuit brought against Trump University.

Trump’s proclivity for litigation has a long history. The candidate and his businesses have been involved in a minimum of 3,500 lawsuits over the past 30 years, USA Today reported. That’s an average of over 116 lawsuits annually, and more than the number of Freedom of Information Act lawsuits filed in the entirety of Barack Obama’s presidency (2,609 cases), according to the FOIA project.

 

Some of Trump’s more colorful lawsuits include a 1984 action against the Chicago Tribune after the paper published a piece saying that one of the businessman’s planned hotels would be shorter than the Sears Tower. He also sued a labor union for trying to “damage the reputation” of Trump Hotels Las Vegas, after the union claimed in flyers that he had refused to stay there on his campaign trail in 2015.

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Fortune has reached out to Trump’s campaign for comment, and will update this story if we hear back.

About the Author
Lucinda Shen
By Lucinda Shen
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