Trump Lawsuit Update: Restaurant Case Deposition Set Just Before Inauguration, Melania Appears In Maryland Court

Donald Trump is continuing to pursue a lawsuit against a famed chef who refused to open a restaurant in his Washington, D.C., hotel after controversial comments the president-elect said about Mexicans and other minorities during the kickoff of his presidential campaign. Meanwhile, as Trump prepares for a deposition set just weeks before he assumes the Oval Office on Inauguration Day, the next First Lady Melania Trump is fighting her own legal battles from along the campaign trail.

Trump filed a $10 million lawsuit against the Topo Atrio restaurant in the District of Columbia, which celebrity chef Jose Andres would have operated in the real estate mogul’s newly opened luxury hotel. His lawyers demanded the upcoming deposition take place inside of Trump Towers rather than the previously agreed upon location of Washington, D.C. in a filing last week, citing security concerns, as well as a limit on the amount of time Trump can be questioned from seven hours to two.

Alan Garten, Trump’s general counsel, said the president-elect’s team wants to minimize his deposition as much as possible. "We think the deposition is completely unnecessary," Garten told USA Today. "So we asked for there to be some reasonable limits. We don’t think it’s necessary, the issues that concern the president-elect are statements he made at the commencement of the campaign. There’s no dispute about them. So we don’t see what a deposition would accomplish."

The defendants in Trump’s lawsuit agreed to relocate the deposition to the Trump Towers last week, though attorneys noted it was odd the president-elect couldn’t garner security to visit the nation’s capital for a scheduled meeting.

"It seems dubious that the president-elect cannot be afforded adequate security in the capital of the United States, but defendants are willing to accommodate that demand," the lawyers wrote in a letter to the presiding judge, though they urged the court to keep Trump’s deposition time limit to seven hours. "Defendants cannot, however, accept Trump LLC’s attempt to hamstring defendants’ questioning of the man who directed the bringing of this lawsuit."

Meanwhile, Trump’s wife appeared in a Maryland court Monday for a defamation lawsuit she filed against The Daily Mail Online and a writer. "Mrs. Trump was not required to attend the court conference, but chose to do so, to meet the Judge, meet opposing counsel, and show her commitment to the case," her attorney’s office said in a statement. "Mrs. Trump looks forward to seeing the case to a successful conclusion."

These aren’t the only cases the Trumps will continue to battle after becoming the first family: the president-elect has at least 75 pending lawsuits pending, each extending after he takes office Jan. 20. Recently, the president-elect paid $25 million to settle fraud lawsuits over Trump University, a for-profit education company he established in 2005 and closed in 2010.