First Department Reinstates Retaliation Claim Against Trump 2016 Campaign

On October 22, 2026, the New York Appellate Division, First Department decided in favor of Lerner Freeman Law’s client, Jessica Denson, and reinstated her New York City Human Rights Law retaliation claim against the 2016 Trump Campaign. The Campaign sued Jessica in arbitration for $1.5 million after she filed a sex discrimination lawsuit against it, claiming she had violated Trump's notoriously overbroad NDA--which has since been invalidated thanks to Jessica's efforts in federal court.

As the court put it, Jessica's evidence was enough for a jury to conclude that the Campaign commenced arbitration "to unlawfully silence [her] from exercising her legal rights" and that "the enforcement of the NDA was merely pretext for discrimination." In partnership with Lerner Freeman Law, Jessica looks forward to vindicating her rights against the Campaign at trial before a jury of her peers.