LEGAL
Court Walks Away From #WalkAway Lawsuit
Defamation, bias claims versus Center, activists by Brandon Straka, colleagues dismissed
BY DUNCAN OSBORNE
A defamation, breach of
contract, and discrimination
lawsuit brought
against the Lesbian,
Gay, Bisexual & Transgender
Community Center, two of its employees,
and two other individual
defendants by the founder of the
right wing #WalkAway movement
and two of his colleagues was dismissed
by a state judge.
“We are deeply gratifi ed that
the Court recognized the Walk-
Away suit as the legally baseless
nonsense it was,” J. Remy Green,
a partner at Cohen & Green who
represented Gordon Beeferman
and Jason Rosenberg, the two individual
defendants, wrote in a
statement. “It is unfortunate, however,
that New York lacks a robust
mechanism to shift the costs of
suits like this to the people who
bring them and the lawyers who
give the terrible advice that leads
to fi ling them.”
In a July 1 decision, Judge Kathryn
Freed, who presides in Manhattan
Supreme Court, dismissed
all six counts of the lawsuit that
Brandon Straka, the founder of
the #WalkAway movement, and
Youtube infl uencers Mike Harlow
and Blaire White brought against
The Center, Glennda Testone, its
executive director, Gabriel Farofaldane,
a Center staffer, and Beeferman
and Rosenberg.
The #WalkAway movement urges
Democrats to abandon that political
party and join the Republican
Party. Straka, who is gay and
founded the movement in 2018,
gained widespread attention in
conservative media and on social
media outlets in 2018 and 2019.
He also produced a series of town
hall meetings that were intended
to carry the movement’s message
to a broader audience.
In 2019, he booked space at The
Center for a town hall with Harlow,
who is gay, White, who is transgender,
and Rob Smith, who is gay and
was a leading advocate for ending
the ban on lesbian and gay people
serving in the military. Smith did
A State Supreme Court judge in Manhattan has dismissed the #WalkAway lawsuit against the LGBT
Community Center and several activists.
not join the lawsuit.
Straka signed a contract with
The Center and paid a $650 rental
fee. Following a community outcry,
including an open letter that harshly
characterized the plaintiffs, The
Center cancelled the event and returned
the fee to Straka.
The plaintiffs sued last year
charging that the cancellation was
a form of discrimination based
on their sexual orientation and
gender identity. The open letter, a
Rosenberg tweet, and The Center’s
cancellation notice were defamatory,
they alleged.
Freed dismissed the discrimination
claims saying the plaintiffs
had not met the legal standards
required for such charges and had
contradicted themselves by asserting
that The Center had “used its
policies as a pretext, or cover, for
not wanting to permit one of their
own to express controversial views”
in their amended complaint.
“Because this documentary
evidence fl atly contradicts the
amended complaint’s allegations,
this Court concludes that plaintiffs
have failed to plead facts to
demonstrate that defendants denied
them the use of The Center’s
location because of their sexual or
gender identities,” Freed wrote.
The defamation claims against
TWITTER/ @BRANDONSTRAKA
Testone, Farofaldane, and The
Center arising from the town hall
cancellation notice, which was
posted on The Center’s website and
Twitter account, were dismissed
because “the amended complaint
does not allege that Farofaldane
had anything to do” with that notice
and “the amended complaint
does allege that Testone ‘issued’
the statement,” but “the printouts
of those two documents belie that
allegation, since Testone’s name
does not appear anywhere on either
of them.”
Freed also concluded that any
objectionable material in the cancellation
notice was a matter of
opinion, which is protected speech,
as opposed to a false statement of
fact, which can be the basis for a
defamation claim.
The defamation claims against
Beeferman and Rosenberg were
also dismissed. In a single tweet,
Rosenberg charged that the plaintiffs
had used “queer slurs.” Green
fi led a large number of documents
showing that the plaintiffs had
used terms like “gaystapo,” “leftist
crap,” and many variations of antitransgender
slurs.
“This Court fi nds that the individual
defendants have demonstrated,
by documentary evidence,
that the assertion in Rosenberg’s
March 19, 2019 Tweet, that ‘panelists
have used queer slurs,’ was a
true statement,” Freed wrote. The
truth is an absolute defense in a
defamation lawsuit. While Freed
wrote that Beeferman’s descriptions
of the plaintiffs were “ungenerous
personal characterizations,”
they were “expressions of opinion
that are protected by the First
Amendment.”
A cyberbullying claim was dismissed
because New York law does
not create a cause of action for
such claims. The breach of contract
claim was dismissed because
“These allegations do not allege
a ‘unilateral cancellation without
prior notice and without valid reason;’
indeed, they appear to indicate
the opposite.”
Freed also noted that the plaintiffs
had failed “to produce the alleged
contract or to plead which of
its terms were breached and how.”
When Gay City News called
Straka for comment, he had not
yet learned that the case was dismissed
and declined comment.
Gay City News emailed a copy of
the decision to him and asked for
comment. The Center and its lawyer
did not respond to requests for
comment.
Green had asked for sanctions
against Straka and his attorneys
for fi ling a frivolous lawsuit, but
Freed denied that motion.
“At the end of the day, the
Court’s reluctance to fi nd the case
frivolous — despite suing under a
non-existent cause of action, fi ling
uncited plagiarized papers, and by
and large not engaging with the
arguments actually being made
— shows the need for New York to
pass the anti-SLAPP bill languishing
in the legislature,” Green wrote.
SLAPP lawsuits, or a strategic lawsuit
against public participation,
are fi led to attack activists with
court costs and the threat of an
expensive judgment to deter public
action.
Beeferman, Rosenberg, and
Green have created a GoFundMe
page to defray their legal expenses.
It raised over $2,000 in its fi rst few
hours.
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