CINCINNATI, Ohio, February 24, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – A federal appeals court today ruled in favor of a pro-life group that said a law regulating political speech censored them and subjected people across the political spectrum to the threat of baseless lawsuits from spurned politicians.
In 2010, the Susan B. Anthony List campaigned against Rep. Steve Driehaus of Ohio, who described himself as a “pro-life Democrat.” After Driehaus voted for the Affordable Care Act, conventionally known as ObamaCare, the pro-life organization accused him of supporting taxpayer-funded abortion and considered placing a billboard in his district.
The billboard was never erected, but Driehaus lost to Republican Steve Chabot in the 2010 midterm elections by seven points.
He then promptly sued SBA List for “loss of livelihood” and cited an Ohio law prohibiting political ads from containing false statements.
SBA List said their allegations were true, that ObamaCare did fund abortion-inducing drugs and otherwise subsidized abortion, and that the law amounted to a state-appointed truth commission.
“The First Amendment forbids government from acting as a ‘truth commission’ on matters of public debate,” said Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Casey Mattox after today's ruling. “The Sixth Circuit understood that this type of government intrusion has no place under the Constitution. The court was right to affirm, as the district court did, the freedom of Susan B. Anthony List and all the people of Ohio to speak in accordance with their views.”
U.S. District Judge Timothy Black, an Obama appointee, allowed Driehaus' lawsuit to move forward in 2011, unleashing a process that saw federal authorities seize the SBA List's computers as “evidence” in June 2012. Black dismissed the case in 2013.
Driehaus then appealed to the Sixth Circuit, which ruled that the pro-life group could not challenge the law.
In June 2014, the Supreme Court unanimously remanded the case back to a lower district court. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the law could instigate frivolous lawsuits that would chill free speech during elections, and “petitioners, who intend to criticize candidates for political office, are easy targets.”
A district court then overturned the Ohio state law.
In today's decision, a panel of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Court agreed that “Ohio fails to screen out frivolous complaints” and targets “core political speech.”
“Susan B. Anthony List’s goal from the beginning has been to educate voters about the multiple abortion-funding provisions in ObamaCare and expose those elected officials who voted for it,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony List. “Everything we have argued is true. Today is our final victory against the law that chilled our free speech right to speak to the reality of abortion-funding in ObamaCare.”