WATCH: Jake Tapper Panics After ABC’s Massive Settlement With Trump: ‘Wildly Ridiculous’

CNN’s Jake Tapper was not happy with ABC News’ decision to settle a defamation lawsuit with President-elect Donald Trump, which was filed after network anchor George Stephanopoulos repeated the false claim that Trump was found liable for “rape” in a contentious interview earlier this year.

On Sunday, it was reported that ABC News had agreed to a multi-million-dollar settlement after Stephanopoulos made false statements about the E. Jean Carroll civil case during an interview with U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) this past Spring. As the case was set to move to the discovery period — during which Stephanopoulos would have been forced to sit for a lengthy deposition and provide access to personal emails — the network opted to settle the case out of court.

According to the settlement, which was filed publicly on Saturday, ABC News will pay $15 million as a charitable contribution to a “presidential foundation and museum to be established by or for the Plaintiff.” The network has also been ordered to pay an additional $1 million to cover the president-elect’s legal fees and will issue a formal apology.

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On Monday, Tapper was one of several mainstream media pundits to express his outrage over the settlement. While reacting to President-elect Trump’s lengthy press conference — during which he touched on the settlement and a number of additional topics — Tapper noted that Trump appeared to be in a particularly cheerful mood.

“Because this weekend ABC News agreed to pay $16 million including legal fees to settle a defamation lawsuit brought by Trump against the network and their anchor George Stephanopoulos. And that obviously will not be the end of this campaign against the media legal campaign against the media,” the CNN host said, pointing to Trump’s plans to bring a lawsuit against CBS News over allegations of deceptive editing in the network’s interview with Vice President Kamala Harris.

“I mean this is, this is wildly ridiculous,” Tapper said.

The ABC settlement came after network anchor GeorgeStephanopoulos and U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) were discussing the highly controversial civil sexual assault case brought against Trump in New York City, which required New York lawmakers to pass a law to expand the statute of limitations for alleged sexual assault crimes. The Adult Survivors Act allowed alleged victims to file civil suits against their alleged attackers within a certain window, even if the state’s statute of limitations on the claim had expired.

The act allowed alleged victims to file claims within a one-year window that expired in November 2023. It is best known for providing the basis for E. Jean Carroll — a woman who once described rape as “sexy” — to bring a claim against Trump without any evidence in support. Carroll could not provide an exact date for when the alleged assault took place inside a busy New York City department store, had no corroborating witnesses, told a story that matched an episode of Law and Order and once posted a hypothetical about having sex with Trump for money.

Despite the dubious nature of the case, a jury awarded Carroll with $83.3 million in damages after finding him liable for “battery.” The bulk of the penalty was awarded after a New York jury found that Trump “defamed” Carroll by defending himself against the accusation.

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