Joy Reid Loses To La Liberte: MSNBC Host Creates New Precedent Binding Media
By: Roslyn La Liberte (JONATHAN TURLEY)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
MSNBC's Joy Reid has two notable developments this week. She was named as the new nightly anchor to replace Chris Matthews and lost a major appeal in a defamation lawsuit tied to her prior position. Reid has a history of controversial statements including her insistence that her posts on her blog with homophobic comments were fabricated by hackers. She later apologized for the postings that she claimed that she made. She acknowledged "I can definitely understand, based on things I have tweeted and have written in the past, why some people don't believe me." She was sued in one of the most notorious postings on social media by Roslyn La Liberte, a Trump supporter, who was trashed by Reid for comments that she never made and an account that proved to be untrue. Reid relied on California's Anti-Slapp statute and immunity arguments to try to force La Liberte out of court, even though she again later apologized. Now the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has handed down a major ruling against Reid that could undermine future defenses by media figures.
Reid retweeted this image of La Liberte in the MAGA hat from a city council meeting in California during debate over SB 54, a law limiting local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration authorities. Reid first retweeted the image with the caption, "You are going to be the first deported." Then, in a second post on Instagram, she wrote that the woman in the photo had screamed "You are going to be the first deported … dirty Mexican!" In additional postings on Instagram and Facebook, Reid said "Make the picture black and white and it could be the 1950s and the desegregation of a school. Hate is real, y'all. It hasn't even really gone away."
The problem is that the image was false as was the account. La Liberte is the daughter of immigrants and was described as trying to calm the situation down. The 14-year-old at the center of the controversy was shown hugging La Liberte after their exchange. As stated in a federal complaint, the misleading caption and posting to Reid's1.24 million followers was a classic defamation action. The complaint states:
"An interview of the young man confirming that La Liberte did not utter any racial slurs and was otherwise civil to him. He states, among other things, that he "felt like [La Liberte] was still trying to keep it civil which I appreciate"; "she was being civil"; and "[s]he doesn't deserve it because she was giving her opinion at a place where everyone should be able to say their peace."
Two days after posting her comments, Reid apologized by saying "It appears I got this wrong. My apologies to Mrs. La Liberte and Joseph." The failure to specify what she "got wrong" and the use of "appears" led La Liberte to object that the apology was too little and too late.
Reid's counsel then however successfully used the California law against La Liberte when she sought a defamation action. La Liberte was first declared a limited public figure for the purposes of the defamation. We have previously discussed this status. The status imposes the higher standard first imposed in New York Times v. Sullivan for public officials, requiring a showing of "actual malice" where media had actual knowledge of the falsity of a statement or showed reckless disregard whether it was true or false.
This status determination turns on Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 352 (1974) and its progeny of cases. The Supreme Court has held that public figure status applies when someone "thrust[s] himself into the vortex of [the] public issue [and] engage[s] the public's attention in an attempt to influence its outcome." A limited-purpose public figure status applies if someone voluntarily "draw[s] attention to himself" or allows himself to become part of a controversy "as a fulcrum to create public discussion." Wolston v. Reader's Digest Association, 443 U.S. 157, 168 (1979).
This case shows how easy it is to fall under the higher standard. Just because she appears in the meeting, the district court found that La Liberte had become a limited public figure. The Second Circuit disagreed and stated "Thin as the findings are to begin with, the district court did not take into account the requirement that a limited purpose public figure maintain 'regular and continuing access to the media.'"
It also rejected the use of the California anti-Slapp statute to shift attorney fees to the winner under California's anti-SLAPP statute. The Second Circuit ruled that the state anti-SLAPP law was inapplicable in federal court which follows countervailing standards on the necessary showing for cases. Under federal rules, a plaintiffs must show only a plausibility — not the probability — of prevailing. It also ruled that Reid does not enjoy immunity under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
Each of these holding would be a considerable loss but their combination in one case is a devastating loss for media defendants.
Here is the Second Circuit opinion.
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Legal action is the proper prescription for what ails the media
Its amusing to watch Trump supporters complain about inaccuracies in social media.
Inaccuracies????
I think it was a far leap from a simple mistake!
How many think falsely quoting the woman via "You are going to be the first deported … dirty Mexican!" is an inaccuracy?
Perhaps as many as those who thought all the lies and doctored photos from Fox News were just "inaccuracies".
" Fox News on Tuesday issued a public retraction of a controversial article it published last week on the investigation of DNC staffer Seth Rich’s murder. “On May 16, a story was posted on the Fox News website on the investigation into the 2016 murder of DNC Staffer Seth Rich,” Fox’s note read. “ The article was not initially subjected to the high degree of editorial scrutiny (aka they had zero evidence and just pulled it out of their voluminous asses) we require for all our reporting. Upon appropriate review, the article was found not to meet those standards and has since been removed.”
Or this one...
"The (Fox News) network was forced to issue a lengthy correction of the entire piece Thursday, admitting that the story was bogus and they had been duped .
“Unfortunately, all of Garofalo’s claims turned out to be untrue. The fact is that he did not serve in Vietnam,”
" the (Fox News) network claimed that the Libyan Ministry of Information was using Western journalists as human shields and said it wasn't taking the Libyan government up on an invitation to meet with officials for fear of being used as a propaganda tool."
"national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin saying "Earlier today I reported that Fox News had not gone to Qaddafi's compound ... I've since learned that Fox News did indeed go.. he did in fact send a security guard with a camera to the compound... I did not know about that ... That was my mistake and I apologize for the error."
" Fox News published digitally altered and misleading images on its website's homepage Friday that made a demonstration in Seattle, in which a group of largely peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters have occupied six city blocks, appear violent and dangerous."
man, that is SOME deflection!!!!!
Did you see Fox in the article?
Know why you didn't?
Because Fox is NOT THE TOPIC--no matter how hard you spin!
One thing that Fox News never did was lie day after day for 3 years about the President of the United States of America conspiring with "Russia!"
I believe media "inaccuracies" were the topic, no? Conservatives love jumping on any liberal or progressive network that makes an error and has to make a retraction but seem to intentionally ignore them when they come from their own precious conservative media. All the hypocritical undeserved "higher than thou" happy dances were getting tiresome.
Don't worry Vic, over the next few decades you'll get to enjoy eating all those words as the evidence is uncovered and old Trump allies who lied for him come forward once he's behind bars. Mueller wasn't able to get concrete evidence of criminal conspiracy because Trump was surrounded by liars. Stone even admitted as much the other day indicating he did have dirt on Trump that he was just loyally keeping quiet about and thus deserving of his commutation. Trump pays his whores to keep quiet, he pays his friends to keep quiet, he protects convicted felons, he's been credibly accused of sexual assault by more than two dozen women, even his own niece exposed him for the narcissistic petty moron he is. It will all come out eventually, though by then I'm sure you'll have moved on to some other bullshit excuse to deflect any blame for supporting such a corrupt piece of shit.
To the contrary, every day more evidence emerges of the senior Obama officials from US law enforcement & intelligence agencies who used electronic surveillance and secret human sources to spy on and entrap the Trump campaign team. It won't be long before Bob Mueller is again deflecting questions that "were beyond his purview."
Please tell us again what all this has to do with Joy Reid's blatant lying?
No. The topic is Joy Reid
Still waiting for Andy McCabe, Comey, Holder, Lynch, Clapper, et.al., and "the rest" to be rounded up and indicted.
You must feel pretty smug that they have glided thus far. You like the fact that people in government seldom get prosecuted.
If any of the them do get indicted, you'll be the very first I come looking for. All the worst to them!
What's less amusing is that Turley seems to think that he had to lie to bolster his agenda.
He claims that:
Yet Reid posted a Fox News interview with La Liberte along with her apology.
Which does diddly-squat to change what she did.
Fuck the fake apology.
She made it for financial and legal reasons.
Reid never admitted to lying!
Her blatant LYING is the issue.
This isn't about Trump.
Not everything is.
Actually it is appropriate and correct. Who do we depend on for news? "Journalists" or the President?
Take anything coming from any cable news outlet with the prerequisite grain-of-salt...
Do you remember The MacNeil/Lehrer Report from the 70's? That was a news show which took a news story and analyzed it, but in an unbiased way. That show IMHO was the model for the news programming we now see on Cable TV. It's not supposed to be partisan accounts of the news - it's supposed to be analysis!
Oh, was the point to make this all about Trump?
In that case, excellent job.
That is not hypocrisy. The media is responsible for an accurate accounting of the news. That is it's function.
That has always been true. Journalism requires putting personal opinions aside.
It is best to not trust a word without verification from multiple sources after thorough investigation.
It is currently a necessity, but it should never have come to this. The culture which grew out of the university infected the nation's press corps. Something that cannot be easily dismissed with a simple "times have changed."
That being said, the media and our political institutions are mired in their dysfunction...both needing each other to survive while both doing their best to ignore the reliance on the other....like two parasites sucking each other dry.
You mean like "investigative journalism" being denigrated to the level of nothing more government leaks?
We depend on journalists for the truth and we depend on this president to be a clown. Journalists dont do their job perfectly but this president sure is a good clown.
Well where is it?
Journalists dont do their job perfectly
It doesn't have to be perfect, John - any semblance of honesty would be appreciated by the American public!
The POINT is that Turley lied about it.
While YOU may want that to be the 'issue' Vic, there is NOTHING about Reid 'lying' in your seed.
You can call it whatever you want. Some of us can still recognize a lie when we see or hear it. From the article:
So Reid was apologizing for telling the truth????????
If it was the truth, WTF did Reid "get wrong"???
Let's start right here: "She was sued in one of the most notorious postings on social media by Roslyn La Liberte, a Trump supporter, who was trashed by Reid for comments that she never made and an account that proved to be untrue."
Or are you going to subject us to another exercise in trying to turn black into white?
How about me being more specific?
"Then, in a second post on Instagram, she wrote that the woman in the photo had screamed "You are going to be the first deported … dirty Mexican!"
Those words were never spoken! They were attributed to the woman in the picture by Reid!!!
And that changes Reid's lies how exactly????
Come on, tell us some whopper about the remorse she felt for lying.
Lying bitch is what she is.
You mean "Lying, racist, homophobic bitch".
I'd try to explain the difference between a lie and a false statement to you but if would be a waste of my time.
So Turley didn't accuse Reid of lying. Got ya.
It was a deliberate lie.
Besides, I am not interested in your parsing of "lie" and "false statement'.
To me, when made deliberately, they are the same thing.
I stand corrected!
Doesn't matter if Turley accused her or not.
Simple fact is----SHE LIED!
Or, in your parlance of choice, "made a false statement" deliberately.
Since Turley's blog is about LEGAL matters and he wrote about a libel suit, I'm not parsing words, I'm citing LEGAL definitions.
Oh and BTFW, La Liberte did NOT accuse Reid of 'malice'.
It sure as hell does if the seeder wants to limit the topic to something the seed doesn't support.
Only to you, it seems, only to you.
Just know in your heart that Reid lied, er, made a false statement deliberately.
No amount of word wrangling or legalese will ever change it.
Depends on political ideology, at least here.
Who said it changed anything about Reid? Not I.
I'm not here to follow the sheep.
There is no evidence of that, nor did La Liberte accuse her of doing so.
Since you have nothing to support your statement it doesn't matter.
Me neither.
So?
You may to choose to ignore evidence presented to you, but it won't change the fact that she lied.
Oh, well, I don't really care whether you admit it or not, I know what the facts are.
Carry on!
It is also amusing to see people who constantly complain about Trump lies completely ignore when one of their own does it.
No complaining here. Complaining is just empty words. Here, this liar who works for MSNBC is being held accountable for her wrongdoing in a court of law.
Lock her up!