Niemann sues Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, and Chess.com for cheating allegations

It’s the chess scandal that just won’t go away. Hans Niemann has officially filed a lawsuit alleging slander and libel from Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, and Chess.com over the cheating allegations that have swirled around Niemann over the course of the past several months.

The lawsuit, which seeks a whopping $100 million in damages, was filed in Missouri, the home state of the St. Louis Chess Club and the Sinquefield Cup, where the cheating allegations began. Niemann announced the lawsuit on his Twitter with the statement “My lawsuit speaks for itself,” an echo of statements he began giving reporters and interviewers after his chess matches following the cheating allegations.

The lawsuit alleges that Carlsen is “notorious for his inability to cope with defeat,” and that Carlsen was “enraged” that Niemann “dared to disrespect the ‘King of Chess’” by defeating Carlsen at the Sinquefield Cup. The lawsuit further notes Carlsen withdrawing from the tournament, resigning in two moves against Niemann in the Julius Baer Generations Cup, and making a statement on Twitter saying that he believed Niemann has “cheated more—and more recently—than [Niemann] has publicly admitted” all resulted in the dissemination of false accusations against Niemann. 

The lawsuit also named Chess.com as a defendant, saying that the website banned Niemann “in collusion with Carlsen,” and also names grandmaster and streamer Nakamura as a defendant for “amplifying” the claims against Niemann by streaming and posting videos about the accusations against Niemann and “attempting to bolster” said allegations.

All of these things have resulted in Niemann being disinvited from various tournaments and events, as well as failing to acquire a teaching position at a chess school. This has also, according to the lawsuit, “destroyed Niemann’s remarkable career in its prime and ruined his life.”

While Chess.com previously published a lengthy report on Niemann’s online performances and its suspicions that he has cheated more than he has publicly admitted to, other investigations into Niemann’s recent performance against Carlsen found “no indication” of cheating.

Whether that all amounts to $100 million in damages remains a different question altogether.