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Sufficient allegations': Federal judge refuses to throw out Elon Musk and X's 'thermonuclear' Media Matters lawsuit
Source: Law & Crime
By Matt Naham, Aug. 30, 2024
The progressive group Media Matters for America has failed to persuade a conservative federal judge that X and Elon Musk’s self-described “thermonuclear” lawsuit should be thrown out, propelling the business disparagement and tortious interference case one step closer toward trial in April of the coming year.
In a 16-page ruling in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Judge Reed O’Connor, a George W. Bush appointee who previously sided with Musk on discovery and who reportedly owns Tesla stock, wrote that a review of the “relevant case law” led him to the conclusion that Media Matters, its president Angelo Carusone, and extremism investigative reporter Eric Hananoki must face a suit claiming they tried to “harm” X’s business and spark an advertiser exodus with an article that said the social media company placed major brands’ ads “next to content that touts Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party.”
The lawsuit — similar to a more recently filed X case in Texas against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media and resembling another Musk suit against the Center for Countering Digital Hate that the brother of retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer threw out in March, leading to an appeal — claimed that Media Matters “knowingly and maliciously manufactured side-by-side images depicting advertisers’ posts on X Corp.’s social media platform beside Neo-Nazi and white-nationalist fringe content and then portrayed these manufactured images as if they were what typical X users experience on the platform.”
In a 16-page ruling in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Judge Reed O’Connor, a George W. Bush appointee who previously sided with Musk on discovery and who reportedly owns Tesla stock, wrote that a review of the “relevant case law” led him to the conclusion that Media Matters, its president Angelo Carusone, and extremism investigative reporter Eric Hananoki must face a suit claiming they tried to “harm” X’s business and spark an advertiser exodus with an article that said the social media company placed major brands’ ads “next to content that touts Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party.”
The lawsuit — similar to a more recently filed X case in Texas against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media and resembling another Musk suit against the Center for Countering Digital Hate that the brother of retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer threw out in March, leading to an appeal — claimed that Media Matters “knowingly and maliciously manufactured side-by-side images depicting advertisers’ posts on X Corp.’s social media platform beside Neo-Nazi and white-nationalist fringe content and then portrayed these manufactured images as if they were what typical X users experience on the platform.”
Link to full article