Judge Rules Alex Jones Must Face Suit For Peddling Charlottesville Conspiracies

[DonViejo]

By Allegra Kirkland
March 30, 2019 10:24 am

A federal judge ruled Friday that Alex Jones and other online conspiracy peddlers cannot dismiss a defamation suit alleging that they invented damaging smears about a counter-protester at the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally.

“Victims of vile conspiracy theories should take comfort in Judge Moon’s ruling that Brennan Gilmore’s defamation suit against InfoWars must proceed,” Andrew Mendrala, an attorney with Georgetown Law’s Civil Rights Clinic, which helped bring the case, said in a statement. “Today’s decision shows that the law will protect victims of baseless lies by holding people like Alex Jones accountable for the harm they cause.”

Gilmore sued Jones, Gateway Pundit’s Jim Hoft and several other far-right publishers for falsely labeling him as a “deep state” operative. They claimed that a video he captures and posted online of white supremacist Alex James Fields ramming his car into Heather Heyer was part of an elaborate, staged plot to undermine the Trump administration.

The defendants requested that the lawsuit be thrown out, claiming they were simply exercising their First Amendment right to share theories and opinions about the incident. But in Friday’s ruling, Judge Norman Moon of Virginia’s Western District agreed with Gilmore that they knowingly published these false stories “with actual malice.”

Gilmore was a foreign service officer on leave at the time of the rally, and had previously donated to Democratic politicians. Far-right sites used these details as the basis to declare that he was a paid undercover operative helping to carry out an anti-Trump coup. Jones definitively stated that Gilmore was “high-level CIA,” had helped coordinate the chaos at Charlottesville, and that George Soros was paying him $320,000 a year.

more + copy of the Judge's decision:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/alex-jones-must-face-defamation-suit-charlottesville

[C_U_L8R]

1. Malice

That word sums up just about everything about Republicans these days. Malice.

[sarcasmo]

2. Alex Jones like the NRA will soon be bankrupt.

[Jarqui]

3. Can't happen too soon nt

[certainot]

12. it needs to apply to political talk radio - it should not be considered part off the free speech

spectrum

the fact that in most parts of the us the republicons have subsidized and protected a 20-1 monopoly so no one can challenge that messaging should matter - it's not part of the free speech spectrum.

limbaugh is more subtle than the idiot jones but it's 3 hours of lying and attacks every day

the law will protect victims of baseless lies

what about former obama admin who now get threats because team limbaugh names them as part of the 'deep state' coup vs trump. what about those chased out of their JD jobs because of all that bullshit?

what about the constant hammering the parkland kids have taken from national and local rw radio blowhards all over the country?

does that apply to limbaugh repeatedly calling AOC a communist and she getting death threats?

when they call christine blasey for a liar is okay, but limbaugh called her a paid democratic party operative for 3 weeks straight. they got death threats.

michael mann got death threats when limbaugh used russian-hacked emails in 2009 to create 'climategate' - calling mann a traitor for helping perpetrate a global warming hoax to destroy capitalism

when he yells about baby body parts and then some psycho listening to his denver station kills people at the co springs planned parenthood does it apply?

when some guy living in his van listening to talk radio sends bombs to people the talk radio gods attack all day, does it apply?

[MagickMuffin]

4. "that they knowingly published these false stories "with actual malice."

That's what they do. Hopefully the people suing these malicious froth-breathers will finally see that the 1st Amendment has liabilities.

Thank you Judge Moon and Brennan Gilmore!

[dlk]

5. Malice and Sadistic Pleasure..

Jones and his enablers are seriously disturbed people.

[RKP5637]

6. Free speech should not give one the right to spread the vile lies and distortions, as Jones

and his like do, for profit on large-scale public media. Hate is a business enterprise for him and his cohorts/enablers.

[ck4829]

7. K&R

[Scurrilous]

8. K&R

[malaise]

9. This

“Today’s decision shows that the law will protect victims of baseless lies by holding people like Alex Jones accountable for the harm they cause.”

[A HERETIC I AM]

10. Good. Fuck that guy.

Alex Jones is a maggot. Full stop.

And BTW, if George Soros actually laid out 1 tenth of the money the right wing loons say he does, the man would have a net worth of a few hundred billion!

I want to know how to get Soros to pay me to drive 1000 miles to a protest, since I've read that most lefty leaning protesters are paid by him!

[DoctorJoJo]

11. Alex Now Claims His Psychosis Caused Him to Say Those Things!

Well, hard to argue that he isn't a nut job, but bankruptcy will go a long way towards his eradication.

[dameatball]

13. Maybe when he is bankrupt he can jump through the hoops to get Medicaid to pay for his "psychosis"

treatment.

[oldsoftie]

14. Gonna have to sell a LOT more "survival gear" to pay for these suits, Alex!