U.S. Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch on Friday disagreed with turning away a case challenging liberal protections for journalists and media organizations, saying the court should take a fresh look at the precedents set forth by a watershed 1964 ruling in New York Times v. Sullivan that made it more difficult for public figures to sue for defamation.
"Since 1964 … our Nation's media landscape has shifted in ways few could have foreseen,'' Gorsuch wrote.
He added that "thanks to the revolutions in technology, today virtually anyone in this country can publish virtually anything for immediate consumption virtually anywhere in the world'' and that ''it seems that publishing without investigation, fact-checking, or editing has become the optimal legal strategy'' in the new media world.
Gorsuch said, ''The deck seems stacked against those with traditional (and expensive) journalistic standards and in favor of those who can disseminate the most sensational information as efficiently as possible without any particular concern for truth.''
Thomas, citing the false ''Pizzagate'' conspiracy theory, said, ''Public figure or private, lies impose real harm.''
"Not only has the doctrine evolved into a subsidy for published falsehoods on a scale no one could have foreseen, it has come to leave far more people without redress than anyone could have predicted," Gorsuch said.
The court declined to take up an appeal by Shkelzën Berisha, the son of a former Albanian prime minister, concerning his defamation lawsuit over corruption allegations against him made in a 2015 book by Guy Lawson called "Arms and the Dudes." The book was turned into the 2016 Hollywood film "War Dogs" starring Jonah Hill and Miles Teller.
A lower court ruled in favor of Lawson, the book's publisher, Simon & Schuster, and several other defendants because it determined Berisha was unable to show that allegations of his involvement in an arms-dealing scandal were made with "actual malice." That standard requires public figures and public officials to prove that the statements were made with knowledge that they were false or with reckless disregard of whether they were true or false.
Information from Reuters was used in this report.
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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