President Donald Trump was sued on August 12 in federal court in Manhattan over Truth API, the paid feed that delivers his Truth Social posts to subscribers for as much as $100,000 a month. The lawsuit, filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Yale Law School's Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic, the Public Integrity Project, and Altshuler Berzon LLP, calls the arrangement "extraordinary, corrupt, and unconstitutional." The suit lands less than a week after Trump Media terminated its CRO venture with Crypto.com.
The constitutional argument
The complaint argues that the First Amendment guarantees equal access to presidential announcements. Charging $100,000 a month for a feed of the president's posts, the plaintiffs say, turns a public statement into a private commodity. The Fifth Amendment, they add, bars the government from demanding unreasonable sums for access to official communications. The suit asks the court to stop the program entirely.
How the feed works
Truth API launched on August 1 as a business-to-business subscription. It carries low-latency access to posts from the ten most-followed Truth Social accounts, including @realDonaldTrump, @WhiteHouse, and Vice President JD Vance. The price is $100,000 a month, or $60,000 for customers who commit to three years. More than ten customers have signed, according to interim CEO Kevin McGurn in the company's second-quarter release.
Direct buyers are primarily high-frequency trading firms that ingest the posts to inform algorithmic trading. McGurn said the company would disrupt scrapers that collect the same posts for free.
The prediction market pivot
McGurn said during the earnings call that Trump Media is evaluating licensing the feed to prediction market operators and is weighing deals with large language model developers. The complaint quotes those remarks, describing the prediction market plan as one that would facilitate betting on the president's announcements.
That pivot comes as Trump Media terminated its Trump Media Group CRO Strategy venture with Crypto.com on August 7. Cronos (CRO) fell under $0.05, its lowest price since October 2023. Both companies now plan a marketing agreement putting Crypto.com's prediction markets in front of Truth Social users, replacing the embedded integration announced in October 2025 that lifted CRO 10% in an hour. McGurn said the sector is already crowded with established companies, and Intercontinental Exchange has committed around $2 billion to Polymarket.
The case now sits with the federal court in Manhattan. The plaintiffs are seeking an injunction to halt the feed, and the court will have to weigh the constitutional questions against the company's business model. No hearing date has been set.
