Proposed Florida defamation legislation would make it easier for leftwing lawyers to sue conservative media into oblivion. It could also prevent vital anonymous sources from coming forward with information.
If passed, HB 757, reports the Tallahassee Democrat, will “creat[e] a presumption that anyone publishing a false statement that relied on an anonymous source, acted with ‘actual malice,’ a key legal hurdle for public figures to win defamation lawsuits.”
At the time of publication, the House bill’s sponsor, Pensacola Republican Rep. Alex Andrade, had not returned The Federalist’s request for comment.
Actual malice is a legal hurdle public figures must over overcome when attempting to prove in court that they have been libeled. To have acted with actual malice, someone must know something he or she publicized was false or have acted with “reckless disregard” for the truth.
Should the proposed legislation become law, upon receipt of a complaint, Florida courts “shall conduct an evidentiary hearing to determine” whether potentially libelous content is being presented as a “statement of fact or an opinion.”
HB 757 would allow defamation lawsuits to be filed in “any county” across the state for potentially libelous content posted online and “any county in which the material was accessed” for “material broadcast over radio or television.” The bill further states that if defamatory content is published online, such as an “article or a broadcast,” that content “must be permanently removed from the Internet” within 10 days of notifying its publisher.
In Florida, libel is a first-degree
