Vanderbilt, Southern Methodist, and Tulane’s First Amendment Clinics, along with a scholar, joined an amicus brief authored by Vison & Elkins filed in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that his office planned to sue Yelp for alleged violations of the state’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act (“DTPA”) for a notice posted on the company’s website. In response, Yelp sought a preliminary injunction barring Paxton’s lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, and later responded to the Texas-based case after Paxton filed that action. Despite Yelp’s introduction of “strong” evidence that Paxton’s suit was a bad-faith prosecution initiated against Yelp’s protected speech, the District Court denied the injunction request and dismissed Yelp’s federal suit, citing the Younger abstention doctrine, which limits federal courts’ intervention over claims arising in state court.
Amici argue that the Ninth Circuit should reverse the District Court’s decision for three reasons. First, there is a need for immediate federal intervention to enjoin state prosecutions initiated to discourage or retaliate against the exercise of protected rights. Second, the District Court applied the wrong standard to Yelp’s injunction motion, requiring “concrete” proof of subjective bad faith. Third, failure to reverse the decision would serve as an implicit endorsement of government officials’ use of broad state deceptive practices laws to prosecute truthful, non-commercial speech with which they disagree.
2024.03.19 (014.1) First Amendment Amicus Brief ISO Appellant
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