Fox News Host Files SLAPP Suit Against Reporter Who Exposed His Sexting
from the never-a-dull-moment dept
Another day, another SLAPP suit -- but, unfortunately, not much in the way of an anti-SLAPP law to protect against it. As you may have heard recently, Fox News host Eric Bolling was recently suspended by the channel after Yashar Ali reported in the Huffington Post that Bolling had sent "lewd" texts to colleagues at the station, including the ever popular dick pic "unsolicited photo of male genitalia via text message." Earlier this week, Bolling announced that he looked forward to clearing his name and apparently he's decided to do that by... suing the reporter Yashar Ali for $50 million.
We don't have the full complaint, but Ali has received a summons, which gives us some information. The notice part reads:
The nature of this action is for damages and injunctive relief based on defamation arising from the defendant's efforts to injure plaintiff's reputation through the intentional and/or highly reckless publication of actionable false and misleading statements about the plaintiff's conduct and character. As a result of the defendant's action, the plaintiff has been substantially harmed.
And...
The relief sought includes, but is not limited to, reputational damages, monetary damages, special damages, punitive damages, costs, fees, injunctive relief and such other relief as is just and proper, in an amount not less than $50 million.
A few important things here. The lawsuit is filed in New York state court, not federal court, and it may stay there as both Bolling and Ali appear to be in the state. As we've noted many times in the past, New York has an embarrassingly weak anti-SLAPP law, something it should really work on fixing (being the "media capital of the world" and all...). Also of note: Bolling is targeting Ali directly and not the Huffington Post, which published his article, or any of the layers of parent companies for HuffPo: AOL and Verizon. It is likely Ali does not have $50 million, though I'm pretty sure that those other companies do. Not that they should or would pay -- but if Bolling is truly seeking $50 million, you'd think he'd target the companies with the actual money, rather than the lowly reporter. The targeting of the reporter alone certainly adds weight to the idea that this is a pure SLAPP suit, targeting a reporter and trying to silence him.
Ali, for his part, stands by his reporting and promises not to be intimidated:
Just received a summons. Eric Bolling is suing me for defamation - $50 million in damages. I stand by my reporting + will protect my sources
— Yashar Ali (@yashar) August 9, 2017
Not going to stop reporting on Eric Bolling or anyone else. I've had family members killed/jailed in Iran, a lawsuit isn't going to scare me https://t.co/nvludsIV87
— Yashar Ali (@yashar) August 9, 2017
Huffington Post has said it also stands by Ali's reporting, and has "no hesitation" about standing by him financially in the lawsuit, further pointing out that he had a fairly astounding 14 sources for his story. It is true that if the claims were entirely made up they likely would qualify as defamatory, but with that many sources, proving they were made up is not going to be easy. Of course, if the point of the lawsuit is just to create a massive hardship for Ali, that part doesn't matter. And without an anti-SLAPP law to make the plaintiff pay the legal fees, such cases can be overwhelming.
One other element of this is that Bolling's lawsuit might serve another purpose: scaring anyone else (beyond the 14 who have already spoken) from speaking out about potential misdeeds for fear of having that info come out in a lawsuit. That's a separate form of chilling effects created by these kinds of lawsuits, and a problem in and of itself.
It seems quite likely that Ali will seek to have the case tossed out as early as possible, but if it actually goes to discovery, well... I'm not sure Bolling will enjoy opening himself up to that. When people get angry over coverage, filing a defamation lawsuit often is their instinctual reaction -- but it can certainly backfire.
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Filed Under: anti-slapp, chilling effects, defamation, eric bolling, intimidation, new york, slapp, yashar ali
Companies: huffington post
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You are what you text.
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Pick one.
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Ari probaby has pics
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You automatically believe the reporter and discount the accused in the article above - how about waiting until the facts come out?
Maybe the original report is just another step in the progressive agenda to take apart Fox News. If you can't counter the message, take out the messengers.
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Until it didn't.
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In other words, trust me, I'm a reporter. And THAT'S never been a problem with media stories recently, right?
How about some proof? Copy of the message/picture? Date they were sent? The number they were sent from? Whose penis was in the picture even? Did Bolling just forward pictures of Anthony Weiner's junk maybe?
Or is the expectation of reporting excellence fallen to the point of "someone said this, so it must be true".
Come on, I could find 14 "anonymous sources" to back up my story about how the earth is shaped like a burrito - it doesn't make the story true or accurate tho...
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Well, clearly someone is lying, right? So, three possibilities:
1) Yashar Ali faked an entire report with 14 fake sources and got it past his editors to destroy one Fox News host for... reasons 2) Fourteen people either intentionally or by coincidence colluded to tell lies to a reporter take down one Fox News host 3) A man got caught sending unsolicited dick pics and is now denying it
You are absolutely right that we can't know for certain which is the case without more hard facts. Presumably if Bolling is telling the truth, the lawsuit will move forward and we'll start to get those facts. In the mean time, as far as forming my own opinions about what is likely to be the truth, I'm going to apply Occam's Razor -- and it's pointing square at option #3.
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All he has to do is tell the world why he was suspended, and then Fox could confirm, and the story would be over...assuming it wasn't actually sexting. Since he hasn't taken these steps, we can conclude one of two things:
1) The whole story is true, and he's lying.
2) The actual reason for his suspension is even worse, and admitting it is less desirable than being accused of sexual harassment.
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See: Roger Ailes
See: Bill O'Reilly
See: Bill Cunningham
See: Sean Hannity
See: whoever the next one is, and there WILL be more
So while it's of course unfair to conclude that all men at Fox are misogynist predatory assholes, we should not be in the least bit surprised that some of them are. Surely nobody thinks that the last one's been fired, do they?
I look forward to discovery, if it gets that far.
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Definitely need many more objective facts before taking any position other than an article was published and the subject of the article is challenging it's truthfulness.
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This is just sad.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._Sullivan
Ali doesn't have to prove the story was accurate; Bolling needs to show (among other things) that Ali wrote the story "with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not."
It's a pretty high standard in order to shield reporting on matters of public interest.
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Notice that the twitter account says HuffPo "spoke to 14 sources" but not that "14 sources confirmed" anything.
Perhaps you should go beyond the Twitter account, and read the actual article being sued over, which explains the nature of the sources and what they said in much greater detail.
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/eric-bolling-fox-news-text-messages_us_5984d2bbe4b0cb15b1 be6d65
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Easy proof then - what was the number? A simple check of who the number belongs to would be, you know, a simple matter of journalistic investigation. Or you could rely on people's recollections instead...
Imagine what a better story it would be with facts associated with it!
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In addition to HuffPost's 14 sources, other news services are finding their own, and other women are coming forward.
Nice try though.
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"If you can't counter the message, take out the messengers."
Isn't this lawsuit explicitly doing what the original article could maybe have been kinda doing?
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No, those would be the 14 sources that gave the information in the first place. How often do you ask someone, "hey, can you confirm saying that thing you just said?"
You realize that the targets of his behavior are also conservative, as is the network that suspended him over said behavior? Of course these are allegations, but clearly not a story invented from whole cloth.
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If you'd read the article, you would know the reasons for the assumption that it's a SLAPP suit. (Hint: they're in the big paragraph in the middle.)
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Wonder if the folks who stood up for Anthony will hew to the defense of Eric this time around. Methinks... not.
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This seems pretty clear from the fact that Bolling almost certainly can't win this case on the merits. He's a public figure and has to prove a higher standard of defamation than regular people, so he not actually has to prove that the claims are false, but that Ali **knew** they were false. And there is absolutely no evidence I'm aware of to even suggest that Ali thought the claims were false, let alone prove such a thing.
So, I'd say this is definately a SLAP suit where Bolling hopes to intimidate Ali and others based on the huge cash demand in the suit. This strikes me as the natural outcome of thin-skinned billionaire Peter Thiel's campaign against freedom of the press.
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Until
And the understanding that HUMANS ARE..
Weird,
Stupid,
Idiots,
That make Spit throwing Monkeys look CUTE in comparison..
If you need proof, Goto youtube and the REST of the internet and ASk about Stupid humans..
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Going for discovery?
Maybe he just wants to find out who the 14 are. His possible motives:
1: "I've only sent 12 pics, two of those sources didn't actually get one- yet."
2: "I've sent out 15 pics, that means one of them liked it! I must find out who at any cost..."
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Re: Going for discovery?
But that begs the question - has he sent sooooooo many texts out that he can't figure out who the 14 source were? Especially since as noted above, more are coming forward on their own to make similar claims. How many women (and men?) did he send messages/pics to?
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That reads like an art museum title card...
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What SHOULD happen...
Your honor I suggest we proceed straight to dickscovery, I would like to submit as evidence 15 pictures of the plaintiffs penis from my sources, anonymised for their pleasure but with date and time stamps intact.
A simple subpoena to his (3rd party, no expectation of privacy) phone provider will confirm his sending these pictures at the dates and times indicated.
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Re: What SHOULD happen...
and his position every 15 minutes from the past seven years, all other text messages he has sent, all calls made and their duration, what kind of phone he has been using, all of the web site URL's he has visited, the apps he has installed, what banking he has been doing...
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How n some years agolong ago?
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Re: How n some years agolong ago?
ALL THIS BS...
and we KNOW that corps pay for nothing..
So who ends up Paying?
TONS of court cases that mean and do nothing, EXCEPT..
its TAX DEFERRED..Tax Deductible..How to Write off your Lawyers..and put the money in the pocket??
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