A federal jury in Manhattan has ruled that the New York Times did not libel Sarah Palin in an op-ed that falsely implicated Palin’s political action committee (PAC) of “political incitement” in the shooting of former Rep. Gabby Giffords.
In June 2017, the same day that a leftist shot Rep. Steve Scalise during a congressional baseball practice, the Times ran an op-ed headlined “America’s Lethal Politics.”
The piece claimed that Palin’s PAC had shared a map with 20 Democratic lawmakers, including Giffords, in “stylized crosshairs” before her shooting. It asserted that “the link to political incitement was clear.”
Palin responded to the outrageous claims by filing a lawsuit against the newspaper and its former editorial page editor, James Bennet.
The former governor was burdened with proving the editor acted with “actual malice” to the jury. Ironically, the “actual malice” standard was set by the Supreme Court in the case of New York Times v. Sullivan, 58 years ago.
Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch have been open about a desire to revisit that standard, which could make libel suits against individuals and publications much easier to win.
According to a report from Mediaite, “The Times’ lawyer Felicia Ellsworth argued to the jury that ‘To win this case, Governor Palin needs to prove that the New York Times and James Bennet did not care about the truth. There has not been one shred of evidence showing anything other than an honest mistake.’”
The Times’ legal team also argued that since she was already controversial, they had a right to libel her.
“Gov. Palin already was viewed as a controversial figure with a complicated history and reputation, and in the time since the editorial was published, Gov. Palin has prospered,” the Times said in a Jan. 17 court filing.
The jury spent just over two hours deliberating on Wednesday.
