A lawsuit against the New York Times brought by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has been resurrected by a federal court.
Palin, a former Republican vice presidential candidate, sued the outlet after it published a 2017 editorial claiming her campaign had encouraged the 2011 shooting of then-Rep. Gabby Giffords. The editorial in question was published on the day of a mass shooting at a congressional baseball practice game.
No such encouragement of connection to the shooting was ever produced — Palin filed suit against the newspaper, alleging staff had intentionally published false information in an attempt to smear her and damage her reputation.
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U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff dismissed the lawsuit in February 2022 in the middle of jury deliberations. He allowed the jurors to finish deliberating and give a verdict, which ultimately favored the New York Times, but lawyers pointed out that individuals on the jury received notifications from the outlet mid-deliberation announcing the judge's dismissal.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan on Wednesday overturned that dismissal and verdict, finding that Rakoff made a series of errors that qualify the lawsuit for a retrial.
"We have no difficulty concluding that an average jury’s verdict would be affected if several jurors knew that the judge had already ruled for one of the parties on the very claims the jurors were charged with deciding," 2nd Circuit Judge John Walker Jr. said regarding the dismissal.
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"We think a jury’s verdict reached with the knowledge of the judge’s already-announced disposition of the case will rarely be untainted, no matter what the jurors say upon subsequent inquiry," Walker said, addressing claims from jurors that the dismissal and subsequent notifications did not affect their decision.
The court noted several other issues with how Palin's lawsuit was handled, including restrictions on her claim that editorial page editor James Bennet allowed the unsubstantiated claims against her to politically aid his brother, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado.
Palin's legal team called the ruling "a significant step forward in the process of holding publishers accountable for content that misleads readers and the public in general."
"The truth deserves a level playing field, and Governor Palin looks forward to presenting her case to a jury that is ‘provided with relevant proffered evidence and properly instructed on the law,’" lawyer Shane Vogt added.
The New York Times called the ruling "disappointing," but said it is confident the lawsuit will be dismissed again in a retrial.
Importantly, the appeals court did not find Rakoff biased against Palin and therefore still eligible to preside over the retrial.
