DCS 2019 Annual Meeting
Leadership Election and Review of Committee Accomplishments and Plans The annual meeting of the MLRC Defense Counsel Section was held on Thursday, November 7th at Carmine’s Restaurant on West 44th Street in New York City. DCS President Jay Brown led the meeting. The first matter of business was the election of a new executive committee…
Fourth Circuit Rules Maryland Online Political Ad Law Unconstitutional
By Max Mishkin The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit has affirmed a victory by a coalition of newspapers that publish in Maryland in their challenge to a state law that would have placed significant burdens on them as platforms hosting online political advertisements. In a 3-0 published decision, the court held…
Why We Are Suing California Over A ‘Labor’ Law
‘Gig Economy’ Law Raises Constitutional Issues for Journalists By Mickey H. Osterreicher and Alicia Calzada The National Press Photographers Association (NPPA) expends a great deal of time and energy advocating for and defending the First Amendment rights of its members. But we know that if visual journalists can’t earn a decent living, the ability to…
Federal Court Orders Disclosure of Former AG Matt Whitaker’s Ethics Disclosure Forms
By Matt Topic When Jeff Sessions was finally berated into resigning the Attorney Generalship by the president whose candidacy he supported long before other establishment Republicans had detected the seismic shift in what was electable in 2016 America, a void was left in the Department of Justice. Bill Barr eventually filled that void with precisely…
Developments in FOIA Litigation: Measuring the Bounds of Exemption 4 After Argus Leader and the FOIA Improvement Act of 2016
By Victoria Baranetsky and Rachel Brooke On December 5, Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting (“CIR”) was successful in challenging the government’s withholding of records under Exemption 4 of the Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”), in the first case after the Supreme Court’s decision in Argus Leader to find Exemption 4 did not apply….
Nevada Shield Law Protects Online Journalists
By Leo Wolpert In Toll v. Wilson et al., 135 Nev. Adv. Op. 58 (Dec. 5, 2019), the Nevada Supreme Court recently addressed the scope of Nevada’s broad news shield statute, NRS 49.275. The Court, in keeping with a history of reading the shield law broadly, held that authors of digital media such as bloggers…
Bada Bing: Insufficient Actual Malice Allegations Doom Defamation and False Light Claims
By Eli Segal In December 2017, the New York Daily News reported on the government-ordered shuttering of Satin Dolls, the New Jersey strip club where “The Sopranos”—HBO’s show about fictional mafia-boss Tony Soprano—frequently filmed. This Daily News article described the club’s connection to “The Sopranos” and explained that the state had closed down the club…
Florida Court Dismisses Pastor’s, Mega-Church’s Defamation Suit Against Univision Under Anti-SLAPP Statute
By Lauren Russell A Florida state court dismissed a defamation action based on statements in a series of news reports that Pastor Carlos Enrique Luna Lam accepted money from a convicted drug trafficker to fund his Guatemalan mega-church, Iglesia Cristiana Casa de Dios. This is one of the first decisions to dispose of an action…
Ohio Court Considers Whether a “Suspect” Is a “Robber”
By Jack Greiner and Darren Ford The Ohio Supreme Court recently granted relief (although perhaps only temporary) to a Columbus television station when it vacated a court of appeals decision that had revived defamation claims against the station. Anderson v. WBNS-TV, Inc., Slip Opinion No. 2019-Ohio-5196 (Dec. 18, 2019). At issue in the case, was…
Supreme Court Allows Defamation Suit by Climate Professor to Proceed, Over Alito’s Dissent
By Dori Hanswirth and Jesse Feitel On November 25, 2019, the United States Supreme Court announced that it would not review a 2016 decision by the D.C. Court of Appeals denying an anti-SLAPP motion to dismiss a defamation lawsuit by Pennsylvania State University Professor Michael Mann. Professor Mann sued after two columnists published articles questioning…
From the Executive Director’s Desk: Santa’s Gift List for Media Players Naughty & Nice
By George Freeman To Donald Trump – Bobblehead dolls of Robespierre, Goebbels, Stalin, Lenin and Mao, all of whom called their foes “the enemy of the people,” as he terms the press To Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham – JFK’s Profiles in Courage, for some out-of-the-box reading To Ruth Bader Ginsberg – At least one…
MediaLawLetter December 2019
Download Publication MLRC From the Executive Director’s Desk: Santa’s Gift List for Media Players Naughty & Nice DCS 2019 Annual Meeting LIBEL & PRIVACY Supreme Court Allows Defamation Suit by Climate Professor to Proceed, Over Alito’s Dissent Ohio High Court Considers Whether a “Suspect” Is a “Robber” Florida Court Dismisses Pastor’s, Mega-Church’s Defamation Suit Against…