MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
You don't often see a sitting head of state taking a U.S. media personality to court, but that is what French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife, Brigitte, are doing. They have filed a defamation suit against conservative commentator Candace Owens over a podcast claiming Brigitte is, in fact, a man. From Paris, Rebecca Rosman tells us more.
REBECCA ROSMAN, BYLINE: In a defamation suit filed in Delaware Wednesday, the Macrons accuse right-wing commentator Candace Owens of spreading what they call, quote, "grotesque lies" in her podcast "Becoming Brigitte." That includes false claims that Brigitte Macron is transgender, that the couple are blood relatives and that Emmanuel Macron was part of a CIA mind-control experiment. The Macrons have filed similar lawsuits in France. The couple's American lawyer, Tom Clare, told CNN's Jake Tapper this lawsuit wasn't their first option.
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JAKE TAPPER: Why sue now?
TOM CLARE: Well, this was really a last resort.
ROSMAN: Clare says he and his legal team reached out to Owens multiple times in the last year, asking simply for a retraction. He says they even shared documents at her request.
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CLARE: And each time we've done that, she mocked the Macrons. She mocked our efforts to set the record straight.
ROSMAN: Now the Macrons want a jury trial and say they're willing to travel to Delaware for it. But U.S. law sets a high bar for public figures. They'll need to prove that Owens knew what she was saying was false. Clare says they tried again and again to correct the record.
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CLARE: You have to come forward with better evidence if you're going to say it. She has none of it. All she's done is mocked them and ridiculed them and repeated it.
ROSMAN: But Owens doubled down on her podcast Wednesday.
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CANDACE OWENS: If you need any more evidence that Brigitte Macron is definitely a man, it is just what is happening right now. The idea that you would file this lawsuit is all of the proof that you need.
ROSMAN: A spokesperson for Owens told NPR she's not backing down, calling the lawsuit, quote, "a foreign government attacking the First Amendment rights of an American independent journalist." But the couple's lawyer say it's about more than reputation.
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CLARE: That's how disinformation takes root.
TAPPER: Right.
CLARE: That's how disinformation wins.
ROSMAN: Clare says the Macrons have filed the suit as a matter of principle. Rebecca Rosman, NPR News, Paris.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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