Roger Stone, former campaign adviser to President Donald Trump, settled a defamation suit on Monday, agreeing to publicly apologize for publishing false information on the right-wing conspiracy site Infowars.
The settlement, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, marks the culmination of a $100 million lawsuit filed against Stone by Chinese businessman Guo Wengui, a vocal critic of Beijing whom Stone, a contributor to Infowars, falsely claimed had been convicted of financial crimes by donating to 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and former Trump senior adviser Steve Bannon.
In lieu of paying the damages, Stone must publish a retraction of the false statements on social media and run ads in the Journal, The New York Times and The Washington Post apologizing for his claims about Guo, who applied for asylum in the U.S. last year after the Chinese government grew hostile toward him.
Stone, whose actions during the election are being eyed by special counsel Robert Mueller, said in a statement Monday that his false statements were based on information he received in 2017 from Sam Nunberg, another adviser on Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“I failed to do proper research before making those statements,” Stone said.