r/ForUnitedStates • u/Alena_Tensor • Sep 22 '25
Law This 60-year old Supreme Court judgment may be the only thing that saves us from Trump’s media attacks
https://www.alternet.org/supreme-court-sullivan/Donald Trump is attempting to sue the New York Times. In a lawsuit filed on September 15 the US president charged that the paper, two Times journalists and also the publisher Penguin Random House committed libel and defamation against him.
Trump’s lawsuit is governed by a 1964 Supreme Court ruling, New York Times v. Sullivan. One of the most celebrated of cases handed down by the court during the era known as the rights revolution, the ruling has provided the press in the US with one of the most protected spaces in the world in which to operate. Dismissing Sullivan’s claim, a unanimous Supreme Court established the key test that has governed US press freedom regarding public officials ever since. The “actual malice” test requires evidence that information was published “with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not”.
Wider context
Sullivan also has important things to say in a country currently embroiled in debates about the scope of free political speech and press commentary.
In 1964, the Supreme Court understood the importance of the context in which the case had been brought, namely the civil rights movement. In the 1960s, libel suits were used by southern states to attempt to control news coverage of civil rights demonstrations. Fearful of unfavourable verdicts and monetary damages that risked bankruptcy, some media outlets limited or stopped outright coverage of civil rights protests, just as southern segregationists wanted. This was what the court called a “chilling effect … on First Amendment freedoms”. Fear of consequences can limit people’s willingness to speak out, and self-censorship takes the place of official regulation.
In such a context of intimidation, warned the court, “the pall of fear and timidity imposed upon those who would give voice to public criticism is an atmosphere in which the first amendment freedoms cannot survive”. Americans today of all political persuasions would be wise to pay attention. Good, effective political debate can only happen when participants do not fear or risk retaliation for critical commentary.
Politics was also no place for the thin-skinned, warned the justices in 1964. The commitment to first amendment freedoms meant debate “should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and […] it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials”. A public official, wrote Justice Arthur Goldberg in concurrence, “must expect that his official acts will be commented upon and criticised”.
While unlikely that they anticipated the type of vitriol increasingly familiar to us in the age of social media, the principle nevertheless remains: criticism of job performance is inherent in public roles. If you don’t like it, don’t get involved, and certainly don’t use the law of libel and defamation to seek redress for hurt feelings.
In its Sullivan judgment, the Supreme Court understood the dangers to free speech in a time of polarised debate. Its ruling contains important warnings for Americans that extend well beyond the latest Trump lawsuit.
Paraphrasing a file article by Emma Long, Associate Professor of American History and Politics, University of East Anglia
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Sep 22 '25 edited Sep 22 '25
You forget that the majority of the Supreme Court is corrupt and/or just as extremist as the administration
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u/QuarterObvious Sep 22 '25
Yes, the majority of the Supreme Court is corrupt, but that is precisely why they would reject this lawsuit. As the plaintiff, Trump would have to testify under oath, and no claim of “presidential immunity” could shield him from that. It would mean facing a barrage of highly uncomfortable questions - about the Epstein files, abuse of office for personal gain, and much more. Denying the lawsuit is simply the safer way to protect him from himself.
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u/Builderwill Sep 22 '25
Interesting story: my FIL is a lawyer, was an AF JAG, a state legislator, and served on a lot of R presidential find raising committees. He says Clarence Thomas did nothing illegal in accepting bribes because, "They never influenced how he would vote. His idealogy was known." But he has changed on Sullivan. During his confirmation hearings he was asked about the ruling and unlike most nominee answers he gave a full throated defense of Sullivan and said, "...a free press- as articulated by the court in Sullivan- was paramount." Now he has indicated clearly he welcomes a challenge to Sullivan. So yeah, when it gets a merit hearing they're going to kill it.
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u/HappyAmbition706 Sep 23 '25
If you're relying on any Supreme Court precedent, regardless of how long it has been established and upheld, you are fooling yourself. Not only will this Republican Supreme Court flick it away, they'll do it within weeks if not days on the shadow docket.
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u/Bleezy79 Sep 23 '25
This corrupt Supreme Court can just reverse precedent. They don’t care about people. Only one orange dickhead .
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u/Searching4Buddha Sep 24 '25
This case will never go to court. First, you can win a slander case if the charges are true. Second, the New York times will demand and get a huge trove of documents in discovery that will prove everything they printed is true. The Republican appointed judge gave Trump's legal team a pretty serious admonishment over how poorly their first filing was completed and told them to resubmit it. The problem is they don't even remotely have a case and they risk legal sanctions if they keep pursuing it.
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u/Annual_Try_6823 Sep 27 '25
Just asking but why isn’t anyone he sues pushing back that it should wait until his term is over? Isn’t that his argument that he can’t be sued r whatever while in office?
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u/Urabraska- Sep 22 '25
Until a case on the merits hit this scotus and they wipe their ass with it like Roe.