The New York Occasions responded this 7 days to a defamation match submitted by President Trump’s marketing campaign,  calling it “an abuse of the judicial process,” courtroom papers display.

Trump’s campaign filed a lawsuit in February in opposition to the paper, charging that a column the Occasions revealed March 27, 2019 defamed the president when it said his 2016 campaign was functioning with Russia to defeat Hillary Clinton.

The Times has now fired again saying when former Occasions executive editor Max Frankel wrote the piece — headlined “The Real Trump-Russia Quid Professional Quo” — Frankel “was accomplishing accurately what the President and thousands and thousands of other People were performing at the pretty exact same time: offering up a personal interpretation of the Mueller report,” according to new Manhattan Supreme Court docket papers.

Instances lawyer David McCraw reported that Frankel’s piece is constitutionally protected speech under the Initial Modification, according to the courtroom papers, submitted Thursday.

“This accommodate is practically nothing a lot more than an hard work by all those who disagree with Mr. Frankel’s views to weaponize the legislation in hopes of silencing voices they do not want the general public to listen to,” the courtroom papers. They also claimed the campaign “does not appear close” to proving genuine malice by the Situations.

A attorney for the Trump campaign, Charles More durable, did not immediately return a request for remark.