Did a Florida court rule that two newsrooms have to be stripped of their Pulitzer Prizes for covering the role of Russia in the 2016 election campaign? No, that's not true: The court's ruling was procedural. The judge only allowed the case to continue, denying the defendants' petition for a stay.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on X where it was published on May 28, 2025. It opened:
President Trump has won his lawsuit with the Pulitzer Prize Board and the New York Times and the Washington Post must give their prize back to Pulitzer. 🚨
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot by Lead Stories)
As seen in the screenshot above, the post reviewed in this fact check repeated one point from a statement (archived here) published earlier that day on Truth Social by U.S. President Donald Trump.
The ruling (archived here) referenced in both entries was uploaded on the website of Florida's Fourth District Court of Appeal on May 28, 2025. In plain language, it explained that Chief Judge Mark W. Klingensmith (archived here) did not decide on the merits of the case at the time -- he ruled to allow the case to move forward:
In their petition, Petitioners assert they are entitled to a stay of the underlying proceedings, including discovery, because the Plaintiff-Respondent is the current President of the United States. They argue a stay of the case will avoid the constitutional conflicts arising from allowing Respondent to proceed as a plaintiff in a state court civil action on claims that may involve his official conduct as the President. For the reasons set forth below, we deny the petition and affirm the trial court's order.
In 2018, The New York Times and The Washington Post received a joint Pulitzer prize (archived here) for national reporting.
As court materials (archived here) detail, Trump initially demanded that the award's board strip both newsrooms of their prizes. In 2022, the board found no grounds to do so (archived here), which triggered the lawsuit's filing.
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Other Lead Stories fact-checks mentioning Donald Trump are here.
