But the arguments in the filing have not deterred Wiener from tweeting. On the day Trump filed suit, Wiener responded with another tweet.

A winning strategy?

The state senator may well be taking a page from the Trump playbook. The president tweets relentlessly. That his proclamations end up as evidence against him in litigation, including a defamation case based on a Trump tweet filed by the adult film star known as Stormy Daniels, has not stopped him.

Perhaps that is because, so far, Trump has ultimately won many of his legal battles. In the defamation case, for example, the judge determined that Trump’s tweets were only hyperbolic, and that lively debate is “essential to American discourse.”

In the “Muslim ban” cases, opponents of Trump’s executive orders argued that his tweets showed discriminatory intent and were based on anti-Muslim sentiment although the orders officially spoke only of national security. While the Ninth Circuit found the executive orders were based in “animus,” considering Trump’s statements, the US Supreme Court majority ultimately ruled a version of the executive order was legitimate. Chief justice John Roberts wrote, “It cannot be said that it is impossible to ‘discern a relationship to legitimate state interests’ or that the policy is ‘inexplicable by anything but animus.’”

The four dissenting justices disagreed and argued that the majority was ignoring the larger context, including tweets. “[Taking] all the relevant evidence together, a reasonable observer would conclude that the Proclamation was driven primarily by anti-Muslim animus,” Sonia Sotomayor wrote.

Now Democrats in California will have to find a way to replicate Trump’s success in swatting away complaints arguing that tweets show true intent.

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