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MAGA Teen Files $250 Million Lawsuit Against The Washington Post

I guess high schools just don't teach defamation law anymore.

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Fresh on the heels of Clarence Thomas wishing he could rewrite the First Amendment to make it easier to sue people, we’re getting a glimpse of what that dystopian future would look like. A team of lawyers have filed a $250 million defamation suit against the Washington Post, on behalf of Nick Sandmann and his family.

The suit alleges many bad things happened to Sandmann after his encounter with Nathan Phillips in front to the Lincoln Memorial. It does not allege that there was no encounter in front of Lincoln Memorial, or that the encounter was captured on video. Seeing as a truth is a defense to any defamation claim, it would be surprising for the lawsuit to survive a motion to dismiss.

You can read the complaint here. If you’ve been following this story, you already know what’s in it. Sandmann alleges that the initial video of the encounter was not the full video. It alleges that Sandmann was targeted and bullied by the Post because he’s white. It argues that Sandmann and his crew were good boys, mercilessly harassed by angry black people. There’s an entire section about Nathan Phillips, which would be interesting if Sandmann was suing Nathan Phillips, but he’s not.

My favorite part is the complaint that the Post did not… think of the children:

15. In this country, our society is dedicated to the protection of children regardless of the color of their skin, their religious beliefs,or the cap they wear.

16.But the Post did not care about protecting Nicholas. To the contrary, the Post raced with a reckless disregard of the facts and truth because in this day and time there is a premium for being the first and loudest media bully.

None of this amounts to “defamation” based on a reasonable application of the law. Sandmann might not like the Post’s interpretation of the video, but that interpretation is protected speech. Since the invention of, like, paint, humans have disagreed about the meaning of depictions. If you show me a video of an unarmed black teenager being shot by a cop, I’m going to interpret that as the cop doing a bad thing. Others might interpret that as the kid “getting what he deserved.” Neither take is defamatory. Sandmann argues that the Post “recklessly” focused on the initial video and not the extended one that showed the mean black people, but whether the mean black people are relevant to the story is itself a matter of opinion.

We don’t have defamation laws to “control the narrative.” We don’t have defamation laws to “protect” anybody, not men accused of sexual harassment, not kids accused of wearing MAGA hats. We have defamation laws to prevent people from making stuff up whole cloth and publishing it. That’s why truth is a defense. The Post didn’t “invent” an encounter between Sandmann and Phillips, one actually took place. How we interpret what went down is protected by the First Amendment.

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But winning a defamation lawsuit isn’t really the game we’re playing here. Instead, we’re fighting a new front in the culture wars, the front Trump has opened up against “the media.” Trump wants the media to be nice to him. Alleged sexual harassers like Clarence Thomas want to be able to punish the media for amplifying claims against them. MAGA wants their wild conspiracy theories and counter-factual views given equal time in mainstream sources.

This is a broad war, the Sandmann lawsuit is just another cannon ball. This lawsuit is not going to kill the Washington Post, and I doubt that is even the goal. The point is to chill other media from challenging the right-wing. Most mainstream reporters don’t even know their rights. Most publications smaller than the Washington Post can’t afford to defend their rights. If enough of the media lives in fear of any teen in a MAGA hat, then this lawsuit was a success even if (when) it gets thrown out of court on a rail.

Their campaign is more or less working. I’m chilled AF right now, and that’s not because of the snow.

The Washington Post sued by family of Covington Catholic teenager [Washington Post]

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Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at [email protected]. He will resist.

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