Trump Deposed In Celeb Chef Case

President-elect Donald Trump sat for a 90-minute deposition last week in a civil lawsuit related to his new hotel in Washington, D.C. The video-taped deposition lasted for 90 minutes, NPR reports. Trump filed the $10 million suit in August 2015 against celebrity chef José Andrés’ Think Food Group. Andrés pulled out of opening a restaurant at Trump’s hotel after the then-candidate for president called Mexican immigrants rapists, and called for building a wall along the U.S. Mexico border. Think Food Group has countersued Trump for $8 million, saying Trump’s disparaging comments hurt business. “The perception that Mr. Trump’s statements were anti-Hispanic made it very difficult to recruit appropriate staff for a Hispanic restaurant, to attract the requisite number of Hispanic food patrons for a profitable enterprise, and to raise capital for what was now an extraordinarily risky Spanish restaurant,” the filing reads. The case isn’t the only one Trump is currently engaged in with a celebrity chef: a pretrial hearing is scheduled for May 17 in a case against Geoffrey Zakarian, who also pulled out of a restaurant project in the Trump D.C. hotel.