The president says the cable news outlet is violating the Lanham Act.

Donald Trump has sent CNN an extraordinary four-page letter that pledges legal action. The missive from Trump attorney Charles Harder references recent videos from Project Veritas purporting to have a CNN "whistle-blower" discussing direction from the cable news network's president Jeff Zucker. "Your own employees appear to state that CNN is focused on trying to 'take down President Trump,' driven by a 'personal vendetta' that Mr. Zucker purportedly has against him, rather than reporting the news in an objective manner," writes Harder. "In the Footage, your employees appear to state that CNN attempts to make its reporting appear neutral and unbiased, when in fact its reporting is far from neutral and highly biased against the President."

The letter contrasts aspirational ethical standards promulgated by media groups with supposed evidence that Trump says he has accumulated about CNN's bias. "The aforementioned examples are merely the tip of the iceberg of the evidence my clients have accumulated over recent years," continues Harder. "We also expect substantial additional information about CNN’s wrongful practices to become known in the coming days and weeks. Never in the history of this country has a President been the subject of such a sustained barrage of unfair, unfounded, unethical and unlawful attacks by so-called 'mainstream' news, as the current situation." Harder claims that CNN — now a subsidiary of AT&T— is violating the Lanham Act for making misrepresentations to the public and advertisers.