Posted on 01/05/2019 12:40:14 PM PST by Kaslin
The New York Times and editorial border member Michelle Cottle on Friday filed a motion to have a Sheriff Joe Arpaio's $147.5 million defamation lawsuit against them dismissed. The lawsuit stems from an opinion piece published back in August that the Sheriff said damaged his reputation, Fox News reported. Cottle's OpEd was published after Arpaio lost the Arizona Republican primary for the United States Senate.
The defendants argue Arpaio's lawsuit lacks any merit:
First, Arpaio is a public figure who has failed to allege facts that could plausibly establish either that the challenged column is substantially false or that The Times published it with the requisite degree of fault, “actual malice” – i.e., that The Times published a false statement about him with knowledge of its falsity or with serious doubts about its truth. In light of the expensive public record supporting the truth of the factual statements in the column, any attempt to amend the Complaint to try to plead actual malice would be futile and dismissal on this basis is properly with prejudice. Second, the non-factual opinions offered in the column at issue are not actionable as defamation in the first instance. And the tag-along tort claims fail for the same reasons as the defamation claim.
Specifically, Cottle accused Arpaio, who has dubbed himself as America's toughest sheriff, of “racial profiling on a mass scale and terrorizing immigrant neighborhoods with gratuitous raids and traffic stops and detentions.”
Arpaio claims the column was maliciously written to keep him from receiving adequate funding from donors for a potential senate run in 2020.
In addition to asking for the lawsuit to be dropped, the Times wants Arpaio to pay for their attorney's fees
I’m not a lawyer, but I have been a party to civil suits and learned the opposing side will try to get the case dismissed and as well as counter sue. It appears to be just a matter of course in civil suits.
This does not mean Joe’s lawsuit is toast.
Actual malice is provable beyond a reasonable doubt simply by noting who published it.
There is an old saying among lawyers that suing entities that buy printing ink by the truck load is rarely a good idea. As much as I hate to say it I think Joe’s case is weak. The legal bar for libel is really high in the US. He has to prove that what was printed was false, that the Times knew it was false AND that it was done with malice.
Arpaio’s lawsuit is going nowhere. I’d be curious to know who is paying his legal fees.
I don’t see anything in the story that matches the headline. The story just describes a routine motion. What’s the “interesting turn”?
You’ve been clickbait-rolled.
Kinda like calling your dad a MotherFu*ker when he sleeps with your mother, right? Now we move on to the president.
1. Didn’t Obama the traitor put out an Ex. Order legalising domestic propaganda, and didn’t Fake News (eg the Steele Dossier) break out all over the USA.
2. Didn’t NYT take to fake news as though their far left editorial board ordered it?
3. Aren’t NY courts rusted on far leftist and competing with San Fran for Obama/Clintonworld MVP?
4. Since this particular fake news was an opinion piece why is’t it kosher under the 1st Ammendment?
Fake news started when it was no longer illegal to put forth opinion and call it news. Thx to Clinton for loss of the Fairness Doctrine; Obama just pushed the advantage.
Sorry Joe is dead to me. He iced the primary for McSally. So we have a bi-sexual commie and Flakes hand picked successor as the AZ senators.
Sorry Joe is dead to me. He iced the primary for McSally. So we have a bi-sexual commie and Flakes hand picked successor as the AZ senators.
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He’s dead to many of us. I expect that he will return in the Arizona 2020 Special election (yep, the seat vacated by the moldering Juan McCain has not yet has its special election to fill the remainder of that seat’s term) to help split the Republican/conservative vote and insure a ‘RAT takes the seat).
I agree. Not “interesting”, rather it is run of the mill lawsuit practice.
He lost my support for the same reason; he split the vote by pulling a Ross Perot. At his advanced age he had no business running for any office.
I hope Joe is successful.
Relative to your post, “Sorry Joe is dead to me. He iced the primary for McSally. So we have a bi-sexual commie and Flakes hand picked successor as the AZ senators.” I sadly agree.
His ego got ahead of his common sense.
So, what was the interesting turn?
motion for dismissial s like the sun rising every morning
I’m not that familiar with the case described in the article - and I am not a lawyer - but I have taken a look at the New York Times v. Sullivan decision. And my conclusion is that Sullivan can and must be eviscerated. Understand, Sullivan was a unanimous decision with strong concurrences, and therefore SCOTUS cannot possibly overturn it if presented with the same facts. The fallacy of Sullivan is that it vindicates the rights which the First Amendment assayed to protect. It does not. It vindicated the First Amendment, all right, but not the rights which 1A assayed to protect.The black-letter meaning of the First Amendment is that the government cannot unify journalism as its own propaganda organ. The intent of the First Amendment, I submit, is that the people have the right to journalism which is not unified by the same entity which controls the government. And that right, ironically, is actually subverted by the Sullivan’s barrier against suing critics of Republicans for libel.
And Sullivan does not prevent Democrats from suing for libel, for the simple reason that Democrats do not get libeled, and therefore would not sue without Sullivan. When I articulate that, you know perfectly well that that is true. We all know that if a politician is caught with his hand in the cookie jar, the decision of whether his party affiliation belongs in the lede is automatically made on the basis of whether that affiliation is R or D. If it’s D, the information may not even be in the article at all. That is a fact which was not as obvious in 1964 as it is today, and therefore was not before the Court. Not that it would have moved the Warren Court all that much . . .
The reality is that the AP in particular and the wire service in general produces virtual meetings of all the major journalisms in America. And that Adam Smith was spot on when he wrote that “People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” And that the conspiracy against the public which has been the result is a massive propaganda campaign creating ideological conformity in journalism. A campaign which claims “all journalists are objective” - and delegitimates any criticism from any actual, ideologically independent, journalist.
IMO the right plaintiff is needed - it should be the Republican Party - and the complaint has to be made antitrust law as well as libel law.
Arpaio is going to challenge McSally in 2020 after she’s been in the US Senate for two years and after he lost to her last Nov?
Won’t he be 80 at that point?
Exactly.
But those not aware of it would think it’s an awful turn of events for Joe, when it’s really a formality. I can’t see how they got such a long winded article out of nothing.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio was, is, and always will be an American hero. All three GOP candidates were flawed.
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