Trump sued over $100,000-a-month early-access offer to Truth Social posts
Donald Trump has been sued after a subscription service charging up to $100,000 a month for early access to his posts on his Truth Social platform sparked allegations of corruption.
The lawsuit, filed in the US district court for the southern district of New York, was brought by the Intercept and the Freedom of the Press Foundation against Trump, two of his aides and the executive office of the president.
It targets “Truth API”, a paid data feed launched on 1 August by the Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind Truth Social. The complaint calls the arrangement “extraordinary, corrupt and unconstitutional”.
The service gives paying subscribers faster access than the general public to posts from 10 of the platform’s highest-profile accounts, including Trump’s own account, as well as those of the vice-president, JD Vance; press secretary, Karoline Leavitt; and other senior officials. Subscribers pay $100,000 a month, or $60,000 a month for a three-year commitment.
The White House and Trump Media did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit.
Trump has a history of using Truth Social to disclose market-sensitive news, including posts on tariffs and the war on Iran, which have triggered swings in stock and oil prices. Trump Media’s interim chief executive, Kevin McGurn, has even promoted the service as a way to give businesses fast access to the platform’s “most market-moving” posts. He has described it as a “high-margin” product meant to provide a “meaningful, ongoing source of revenue”.
The launch followed criticism from the Democratic senators Adam Schiff and Elizabeth Warren, who had urged the Securities and Exchange Commission to examine whether the service amounted to market manipulation benefiting insiders at ordinary investors’ expense.
According to the complaint, Trump Media disclosed on 10 August that it already had more than 10 subscribers, reportedly including financial news outlets and high-frequency trading firms, and was exploring licensing the data to prediction markets while working to block third-party tools that let outside groups scrape and archive Trump’s posts.
The plaintiffs argue that the president, who remains Trump Media’s largest shareholder, with a stake worth roughly $1bn, stands to personally profit from selling privileged access to information generated in his official capacity.
The suit also raises concerns about the historical record. Truth API subscribers get access to an archive of posts stretching back to 2022, including ones later deleted or altered, while McGurn has said the company intends “to create a lot of friction for those folks that aren’t coming to us directly”.
The plaintiffs are asking the court to declare the arrangement unlawful and to bar the administration from relying on Truth Social as the exclusive venue for official announcements while it sells preferential access to that information.
Reporting from The Guardian contributed to this story.
