(To understand what follows, it helps to know that “SLAPP” stands for “Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation.” Anti-SLAPP statutes are designed to discourage such lawsuits and punish those who file them.)
In a post at the Popehat free speech blog, Ken White describes what happened when Ahmed Mohamed and his father “ran headlong into the buzz saw of Texas’ vigorous anti-SLAPP statute.”:
More than a year ago Ahmed Mohamed — later derisively known as “Clock Boy” — had a run-in with Texas school administrators and law enforcement. Your preconceptions may have driven your reaction. … Did he make a clock out of electrical components that was mistaken for a bomb by hysterical and foolish people, or did he pile a handful of electronics into a case intending that it provoke, as some have argued? …
Whatever Ahmed and his family intended before the incident, after the incident they sought to make maximum use of it. …
Mohamed Mohamed, acting (with questionable judgment) on behalf of [his son] Ahmed Mohamed, filed a civil complaint … naming The Blaze, Glenn Beck, the Center for Security Policy (“CSP”), CSP member Jim Hanson, Fox Television, Fox correspondent Ben Ferguson, commentator Ben Shapiro, and Mayor Beth Van Duyne. The complaint, a painfully disorganized and meandering composition, asserted (ambiguously) libel. …
Mohamed’s complaint … carelessly conflates statements of fact and statements of opinion, fails to articulate precisely what statements of fact are alleged to be false, and seems drafted without any informed thought about how to resist the inevitable anti-SLAPP motion. …
As I’ve explained before, an anti-SLAPP statute gives defendants a procedural vehicle to ask the court to dismiss a lawsuit aimed at protected speech, and to recover attorney fees if they win. Fox and Ferguson argued that Mohamed had bolixed up the type of defamation they claimed1, that Fox and Ferguson were merely reporting on proceedings by the school district and city and were therefore protected by Texas’ reporting privilege, that their repeating of the Mayor’s statements was an accurate report of a public official’s statement on a matter of public concern and therefore privileged under Texas law, and that Ferguson’s commentary was a statement of opinion and rhetorical hyperbole rather than fact and therefore not defamatory.
Fox and Ferguson’s [anti-SLAPP] motion was comprehensive and supported by facts, evidence, and extensive legal citations. Mohamed’s opposition was scattered and perfunctory. … So it is not surprising that the court granted Fox and Ferguson’s motion in full and awarded more than $80,000 in fees to Fox and Ferguson.
Blaze and Beck, through one set of lawyers, and CSP and Hanson, through another, also filed anti-SLAPP motions. …
This week, after a length hearing, the court has … now issued orders granting the motions and invited these defendants to submit affidavits documenting their attorney fees for recovery. I’m going to estimate that those fees from these defendants will total between $200,000 and $300,000. …
Ben Shapiro has an anti-SLAPP motion scheduled for hearing at the end of the month. The motion argues forcefully and effectively that Shapiro’s commentary was also opinion, not fact. His argument is, if anything, stronger than that of the other defendants, and I’d say his chances of prevailing are excellent. Mayor Van Duyne also has a motion pending. The motion — filed by a City Attorney — is dramatically less thorough than that filed by the other defendants, possibly to her peril, but she may benefit from the collective impact of the other motions, even though some of her statements are more susceptible to interpretation as factual claims. …
Whether or not the commentary about the Mohamed family was fair or decent or rational, it was patently opinion based on reported facts about an issue of public interest, and therefore protected by the First Amendment.
Mohamed has been utterly crushed by the Texas anti-SLAPP statute. This is the right result; his frivolous lawsuit was a classic SLAPP, calculated to harass detractors, garner publicity, and wage political war through other means. Though he could have been much better represented, the result would likely have been the same, and should have been. This observation is not an endorsement of political or religious triumphalism accompanying this result.