Palin COVID-19 tests delay defamation trial against NY Times
Source: Associated Press AP News
U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff said the trial can begin Feb. 3 if Palen has adequately recovered by then.
Palin, a one-time Republican vice presidential nominee, has had COVID-19 before. She’s urged people not to get vaccinated, telling an audience in Arizona last month that “it will be over my dead body that I’ll have to get a shot.”
When he first announced early Monday that Palin had gotten a positive result from an at-home test, Rakoff said: “She is, of course, unvaccinated.”
He said he would wait to postpone the trial until she completed a test Monday morning. Later, her lawyer reported that a rapid test Monday morning came out positive.
“Since she has tested positive three times, I’m going to assume she’s positive,” the judge said.
Rakoff said that courthouse rules would permit her to return to court Feb. 3, even if she still tests positive, as long as she has no symptoms. If she does have symptoms, she can be looked at on Feb. 2 by a doctor who provides services to the courts, he said.
Palin, 57, sued the Times in 2017, claiming the Times damaged her reputation with an opinion piece penned by its editorial board that falsely asserted her political rhetoric helped incite the 2011 shooting of then-Arizona U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords. The newspaper has conceded the initial wording of the editorial was flawed, but not in an intentional or reckless way that made it libelous.
- snip -
It’s presumed that Palin will be the star witness in the civil case, taking the stand to back up accusations that the Times should pay damages for hurting her budding career as a political commentator. There was no response to messages left last week with her lawyers asking if and when she will testify.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/sarah-palin-defamation-lawsuit-nyt-1e16233f7aa18f914f10a6def4a928c3
- more at link -
= new reply since forum marked as read
So maybe she does have some immunity now.
Who knows? It's still a very dumb thing to do. I'm glad the court has delayed her trial, maybe she'll get some sense.
And by the way, the MAGA crowd would certainly applaud her if she was responsible for inciting someone to shoot a political enemy. I know the Times has good lawyers, and I hope they drag her name through the mud. This trial should be interesting to say the least. If there were any doubt, they would have settled this years ago.
I really had thought she retired, but somebody needs to tell her to STFU.
This lawsuit against the NYT is the only reason we're hearing anything about her. Please Lord, let it be over quickly. Here's my take on it... The NYT gets sued for libel every year. They know how to handle these cases. If there were ANY merit to this case, they would have settled long ago. They didn't settle, they said "Sarah Palin, see you in court." They know they got this.
All that other stuff is just water over the dam.
