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Privacy The Courts United States

When a Politician Sues a Blog to Unmask Its Anonymous Commenter 79

Posted by EditorDavid from the masking-data dept.
Markos Moulitsas is the poll-watching founder of the political blog Daily Kos. Thursday he wrote that in 2021, future third-party presidential candidate RFK Jr. had sued their web site.

"Things are not going well for him." Back in 2021, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sued Daily Kos to unmask the identity of a community member who posted a critical story about his dalliance with neo-Nazis at a Berlin rally. I updated the story here, here, here, here, and here.

To briefly summarize, Kennedy wanted us to doxx our community member, and we stridently refused.
The site and the politician then continued fighting for more than three years. "Daily Kos lost the first legal round in court," Moulitsas posted in 2021, "thanks to a judge who is apparently unconcerned with First Amendment ramifications given the chilling effect of her ruling."

But even then, Moulitsas was clear on his rights: Because of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, [Kennedy] cannot sue Daily Kos — the site itself — for defamation. We are protected by the so-called safe harbor. That's why he's demanding we reveal what we know about "DowneastDem" so they can sue her or him directly.
Moulitsas also stressed that his own 2021 blog post was "reiterating everything that community member wrote, and expanding on it. And so instead of going after a pseudonymous community writer/diarist on this site, maybe Kennedy will drop that pointless lawsuit and go after me... consider this an escalation." (Among other things, the post cited a German-language news account saying Kennedy "sounded the alarm concerning the 5G mobile network and Microsoft founder Bill Gates..." Moulitsas also noted an Irish Times article which confirmed that at the rally Kennedy spoke at, "Noticeable numbers of neo-Nazis, kitted out with historic Reich flags and other extremist accessories, mixed in with the crowd.")

So what happened? Moulitsas posted an update Thursday: Shockingly, Kennedy got a trial court judge in New York to agree with him, and a subpoena was issued to Daily Kos to turn over any information we might have on the account. However, we are based in California, not New York, so once I received the subpoena at home, we had a California court not just quash the subpoena, but essentially signal that if New York didn't do the right thing on appeal, California could very well take care of it.

It's been a while since I updated, and given a favorable court ruling Thursday, it's way past time to catch everyone up.
New York is one of the U.S. states that doesn't have a strict "Dendrite standard" law protecting anonymous speech. But soon the blog founder discovered he had allies: The issues at hand are so important that The New York Times, the E.W.Scripps Company, the First Amendment Coalition, New York Public Radio, and seven other New York media companies joined the appeals effort with their own joint amicus brief. What started as a dispute over a Daily Kos diarist has become a meaningful First Amendment battle, with major repercussions given New York's role as a major news media and distribution center.

After reportedly spending over $1 million on legal fees, Kennedy somehow discovered the identity of our community member sometime last year and promptly filed a defamation suit in New Hampshire in what seemed a clumsy attempt at forum shopping, or the practice of choosing where to file suit based on the belief you'll be granted a favorable outcome. The community member lives in Maine, Kennedy lives in California, and Daily Kos doesn't publish specifically in New Hampshire. A perplexed court threw out the case this past February on those obvious jurisdictional grounds....

Then, last week, the judge threw out the appeal of that decision because Kennedy's lawyer didn't file in time — and blamed the delay on bad Wi-Fi...

Kennedy tried to dismiss the original case, the one awaiting an appellate decision in New York, claiming it was now moot. His legal team had sued to get the community member's identity, and now that they had it, they argued that there was no reason for the case to continue. We disagreed, arguing that there were important issues to resolve (i.e., Dendrite), and we also wanted lawyer fees for their unconstitutional assault on our First Amendment rights...

On Thursday, in a unanimous decision, a four-judge New York Supreme Court appellate panel ordered the case to continue, keeping the Dendrite issue alive and also allowing us to proceed in seeking damages based on New York's anti-SLAPP law, which prohibits "strategic lawsuits against public participation."
Thursday's blog post concludes with this summation. "Kennedy opened up a can of worms and has spent millions fighting this stupid battle. Despite his losses, we aren't letting him weasel out of this."
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When a Politician Sues a Blog to Unmask Its Anonymous Commenter More

When a Politician Sues a Blog to Unmask Its Anonymous Commenter

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  • none at all (Score:5, Insightful)

    by guygo ( 894298 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @12:16PM (#64447702)

    RFK Jr: If he didn't have unintended consequences, he wouldn't have any consequences at all.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      When you're a nobody who wants attention, bad press is better than no press.

    • Re:none at all (Score:4, Informative)

      by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @01:39PM (#64447816)

      Do Kennedys ever face consequences? I mean, Ted Kennedy never saw any consequences. Just did some good ol' drunk driving, barreled his car over a bridge, and left his dinner date for dead even though she probably survived for a time afterwards and ultimately drowned, meanwhile he went back to his party as if nothing happened. He ultimately died in office as a senator while the Democrats sung his praises long after this came to light.

      • Do Kennedys ever face consequences?

        Of course they do, just not to the laws that you and I face consequences with. Ever heard of a Punk Rock band called The Dead Kennedys? Trust me, the Kennedy's face consequences, just not like you or I do. As a matter of fact, the Kennedys are no longer a serious force in American politics. Within a few generations, the Kennedys will only be a historical footnote. Well done Bush family, you finally got 'em where you wanted them.

  • What I like best about Junior (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @12:47PM (#64447736)
    is that he was a Republican plant (his money comes from big GOP donors) that's so crazy that Democrat nut jobs (we've got plenty of ours) seem to be nopeing the **** out on him leaving him pulling more votes from Trump than the candidate he was actually trying to spoil.

    It's telling how weak the modern GOP is that they haven't been able to get a spoiler off the ground. Even the Green Party doesn't have a real candidate this cycle, and from what I can tell what little talk there is around their candidate is just another GOP backed spoiler that the actual Green party voters are spotting a mile away.

    Back when Karl Rove & Dick Chaney were in large and in charge of the GOP none of this would be happening. Those bastards could make a spoiler. But the modern GOP just seems to be nothing but gifters lining their own pockets. I wouldn't be surprised if the party split between the pure girfters and the corporate backed guys. Normally the Billionaires would step in and sort it out but the grifters aren't interested in their money, they wanna sell bibles and Trump Bucks (look it up).

    • Re:What I like best about Junior (Score:4, Insightful)

      by jacks smirking reven ( 909048 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @01:51PM (#64447838)

      Even the Green Party doesn't have a real candidate this cycle

      Not just that but the Libertarian Party which is now under control of the Mises group is having Trump as their convention special speaker so they've at least made it official that they are irrelevant as a 3rd party and have been since 2016.

      I think 2016 and 2020 have effectively made 3rd parties in the USA just done with and until some structural election and voting changes happen it will remain that way.

    • Dude I really think you should watch this:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • Fun fact there's no real need for a Democrat spoiler b/c they're coming apart at the seams. The whole Gaza protest thing has really shown how ill-informed young voters are and formed a wedge issue amongst the wealthy liberals and not so wealthy liberals both residing in urban areas. Will be fun to see what "fortifying activities" will take place between now and Nov.

      • Divesting from Israel companies will do that.

      • Russian? Iranian? Doesn't really matter you're not American. We do not give a flying fuck about foreign policy. There was a concerted effort from Arab American voters to show up for the primary to try and get Joe Biden's attention but the fact is it's not like those voters aren't painfully aware that if Donald Trump is reelected it doesn't matter if they're native born or not they're getting deported. Where? Do you really think Trump cares where he deports them to?

        so those voters are going to show up and
      • They're protesting the destruction of hospitals and schools [barrons.com] and the indiscriminate bombing of civilians [theguardian.com]:

        Civilian proportion of deaths is higher than the average in all world conflicts in second half of 20th century, data suggests

        Protesting that sounds informed to me.

  • is a dead Kennedy. There isn't a single redeeming factor within that entire family line.

    • is a dead Kennedy. There isn't a single redeeming factor within that entire family line.

      This was pretty good: Dead Kennedys [youtube.com]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sjames ( 1099 )

      Jello Biafra for president!

    • That seems perfectly rational.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

        Well not a single one of them has ever done anything useful while they were alive, so...yeah. Very rational.

        • Well not a single one of them has ever done anything useful while they were alive, so...yeah. Very rational.

          I have no desire to get into an internet argument with someone so obviously irrational, so rather than list things like JFK's robust economy (despite all the space program funding that obviously eventually pumped billions into the economy) or his initiation of the idea of nuclear limitation treaties with the Soviets, I'll just let the civil rights crowd argue with you on that point.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

            Just because good things happened while JFK was president, doesn't mean he is ultimately the one responsible for them happening. It's not like the economy was *his* idea and doing. And the treaties with the Soviets haven't ended up meaning jack shit, since Russia has pulled out of all of them. JFK sucked a little bit less than any other member of that family, but barely.

            • Just because good things happened while JFK was president, doesn't mean he is ultimately the one responsible for them happening. It's not like the economy was *his* idea and doing. And the treaties with the Soviets haven't ended up meaning jack shit, since Russia has pulled out of all of them. JFK sucked a little bit less than any other member of that family, but barely.

              Keep moving those goalposts, buddy.

    • Yeah, like all Conservatives.

  • Speaking truth to power (Score:3)

    by Beeftopia ( 1846720 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @02:01PM (#64447858)

    If people could not speak truth to power anonymously, they might not do so at all.

    Which I guess is the point of SLAPP suits and actions like this.

    • If people could not speak truth to power anonymously, they might not do so at all.

      Power operates much more efficiently without a constant barrage of side shots from the peanut gallery.

      Or in other words, Power doesn't need to hear Truth. Power is sufficient unto itself.

      (yes, yes, we all know that without Truth, Power won't last long, but to those in the throes of power addiction, Truth is merely an inconvenience.)

  • To be clear RFK Jr should loose what he ultimately tries to do, but the single sided report in this Slashdot story just shows a complete lack of understanding of law. On the one side he claims First Amendment protects all posts. It doesn't. Defamation is still a thing that exists irrespective of the First Amendment. (Mind you RFK Jr should lose the defamation case). But there are no "chilling effects" of the judge's ruling. They are already well established in law.

    Then they pivot to talking about Section 23

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

      Both are entirely relevant. 230 protects Daily Kos the company/website. First amendment protects the individuals - the anon commenter and Moulitsas themselves.

      The entire Kennedy family regularly gargles donkey semen and should just walk into the ocean never to be seen from again.

      • The first amendment does not protect you from defamation, slander, lible, or incitement. Your anonymity can be pierced quite constitutionally if you break laws.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

          Yeah, and good luck proving any of those against random online comment guy. Kennedy's lawyers are equal cum guzzling morons who all cheated their way through law school. I don't give a shit.

      • Both are entirely relevant. 230 protects Daily Kos the company/website. First amendment protects the individuals - the anon commenter and Moulitsas themselves.

        Re-read what Daily Kos was saying. They were talking about *their* First Amendment rights in the second part.

        And no the First Amendment does not protect an anon commenter from a civil discovery process. It protects them against persecution from the government. This is already well established in law.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

          Yeah. Because they, as individuals also being targeted, still feel like his actions have been a violation of first amendment rights being that he is a politician which is government adjacent even if he holds no current office or role. There were multiple things going on and so each was relevant to different parties (company vs individuals).

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by sinij ( 911942 )

      Make up your mind

      They did, the goal is to smear RFK Jr.

  • Ask not what your country can do for you (Score:5, Funny)

    by Registered Coward v2 ( 447531 ) on Saturday May 04, 2024 @03:23PM (#64447994)
    ask what a court can do for you so you can sue

  • On Thursday, in a unanimous decision, a four-judge New York Supreme Court appellate panel ordered the case to continue, keeping the Dendrite issue alive and also allowing us to proceed in seeking damages based on New York's anti-SLAPP law, which prohibits "strategic lawsuits against public participation."

    Hmmm...

    I wonder if we'll see SLAPP actions by Trump, Giuliani, or Fox News if they win an anti-defamation suit or appeal of one?

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