Former T-Cellular CEO John Legere has been slapped with a $100 million defamation go well with for calling private finance guru Grant Cardone a “con man” and a “bulls–t artist.”
Legere – who constructed T-Cellular into the third-largest US telecom operator earlier than leaving the helm in 2020 – has extra just lately taken to tussling with Cardone, an actual property investor and web movie star who wrote the New York Instances bestseller “The 10X Rule.”
Cardone, who has been featured on Discovery Channel’s “Undercover Billionaire,” has tapped celebrities together with Tom Brady, John Travolta, Kevin Hart and even former President Donald Trump for his conferences, the place attendees pay between $2,000 and $35,000 to discover ways to dramatically scale a enterprise, in keeping with Cardone’s web site.
However in keeping with a Florida go well with filed Thursday in Miami-Dade County, the worth of Cardone’s model has recently been slashed by “an quantity believed to be a minimum of $100,000,000.00” due to Legere’s “false and defamatory statements.”
In on-line chats and social media feedback, Legere has publicly slammed not solely Cardone’s monetary savvy but additionally the very fact Cardone claims to be a billionaire, in keeping with the go well with.
In a single notably testy alternate on social audio app Clubhouse final June, Legere known as Cardone “the most important bull***t artist on the planet,” the go well with states.
“You’re a f*****g con-man, I’ll say this on this room proper now,” Legere stated within the public dialog, in keeping with the submitting. “I imagine that within the subsequent 12 months, Grant Cardone can be discovered responsible of fraud.”
“By the way in which, he’s not a billionaire,” Legere added, in keeping with the go well with. “He doesn’t have near a billion. And he’s … someone who’s self-promoting. And for those who go to the world, go to the world of CNBC, go to CNN, go to the world, ask about Grant Cardone. He doesn’t exist.”
The submitting says Legere was accused by viewers members “of allegedly being drunk, slurring his phrases and showing jealous and envious of Cardone’s self-made standing” when he made among the challenged statements.
A number of months earlier in February and March 2023, Legere had posted snarky feedback on Cardone’s social media, the go well with provides. As an illustration, within the remark part of certainly one of Cardone’s posts about saving his well being, Legere posted “Steroids?”
The go well with claims the remark was “thereby attacking Cardone’s fame with out foundation.”
In accordance with the lawsuit, Legere and Cardone beforehand had been pleasant starting in 2015, when Legere “expressed curiosity in implementing points” of Cardone’s tutorials at T-Cellular. The 2 males then labored collectively to “elevate cash for charity, philanthropic functions and particular causes by way of the Clubhouse platform,” in keeping with the go well with.
However after a short stint recommending Cardone’s VIP well being product 10X well being to dwell chatrooms, Legere “abruptly pivoted away from his collaborative relationship with Cardone, and as a substitute turned hostile towards Cardone,” in keeping with the go well with.
“Legere usually turned extraordinarily defensive, erratic, and combative, searching for to harshly dismiss Cardone’s views, even resorting to inappropriate private assaults directed at Cardone’s background, faith, top, enterprise, practices, dwell occasions, and fame.”
The go well with claims that Cardone privately reached out to Legere and demanded he finish his assaults or the friendship can be over. Legere agreed “he had gone too far and stated he would cease.”
However since then – the go well with claims – Legere has “commenced a marketing campaign designed to defame Cardone, by making claims that lack veracity and have triggered and can proceed to trigger harm to Cardone’s fame within the public neighborhood.”
Because the rift escalated, the go well with claims that in public chats listeners appeared to favor Cardone over Legere.
“The viewers favored Cardone’s opinion on sure subjects, resembling training, financial disparity, the COVID-19 vaccine, politics, training and/or finance,” in keeping with the go well with.
A spokesperson for Cardone declined to remark; Legere didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Cardone isn’t any stranger to scrutiny – and has confronted his personal authorized troubles lately.
Monetary researcher Aaron Smith-Levin, who minimize his tooth working for Invoice Ackman on the apex of the Herbalife battle, has posted movies which have claimed Cardone “stole over $100 million from Cardone Capital Traders.” Cardone has not publicly commented on the claims.
Cardone has additionally confronted lawsuits from traders. One class-action go well with, just lately dismissed, claimed Cardone misled traders concerning the dangers and returns of potential investments.
Different small enterprise homeowners interviewed by Huffington Put up declare they had been caught in “prolonged, rigid contracts” and sued by Cardone to pay out what amounted to tens of 1000’s of {dollars} left of their coaching contracts along with his enterprise. These instances have been settled, the Huffington Put up reviews.
His brother, Gary Cardone – who gave Grant cash to launch his actual property empire – just lately reached a settlement with the Federal Commerce Fee and the state of Florida over claims he and his spouse misled traders and helped bank card scammers escape fraud alerts.
The couple paid a $100,000 settlement and are “prohibited from working with sure high-risk purchasers and utilizing misleading ways to cease customers making an attempt to dispute bank card fees by means of the chargeback course of.”
