Devin Nunes sued Twitter and an internet cow 2 years ago. Where do his 9 lawsuits stand now?
Rep. Devin Nunes two years ago embarked on a campaign to sue organizations he viewed as adversaries, taking them to court over alleged defamation and conspiracies against him.
So far, he hasn’t had much success in court.
Judges have thrown out three of his nine lawsuits. A court dismissed a key defendant in another. Nunes dropped two more of the lawsuits voluntarily.
Nunes, R-Tulare, experienced his latest setback last week, when a federal judge dismissed his lawsuit against CNN.
Despite the losses, Nunes is keeping defendants in court by appealing the decisions against him. Here is where the cases stand.
Twitter and the cow
Allegations: Nunes’ first lawsuit targeted social media giant Twitter, Republican political strategist Liz Mair and two anonymously written Twitter accounts that mock him under the personas of “Devin Nunes’ Cow” and “Devin Nunes’ Mom.” He alleged in the March 2019 lawsuit filed in a Virginia court that the four entities had defamed him online. He accused Twitter of negligently allowing others to defame him.
Status: A Virginia judge in August dismissed Twitter as a defendant from the lawsuit, since social media companies cannot be held liable for what people post on their platforms under federal law. The judge also denied the attempts of Steven Biss, Nunes’ attorney, to file an amended complaint to keep Twitter in court. Nunes and Biss appealed that decision to the Virginia Supreme Court, which denied the appeal on Thursday.
Mair has filed a motion asking a judge to dismiss her from the complaint, which is still pending in the Virginia court. Nunes has not been able to serve the anonymous Twitter users with a complaint, and the company has refused to identify them.
McClatchy
Allegations: Nunes alleged in the April 2019 complaint that he was defamed by a news story in The Fresno Bee that described an employee’s lawsuit against Alpha Omega Winery, a business in which Nunes holds a limited partnership. The employee claimed she was asked to work at a charity function on a yacht that became uncomfortable when guests appeared to use drugs and hire prostitutes.
Nunes sued McClatchy, the parent company of The Fresno Bee, saying it was defamatory to mention his ownership of the winery in a story about a charity function that he did not attend.
He also sued Republican strategist Mair in the suit, alleging McClatchy and Mair had conspired to defame him.
Status: Nunes withdrew his suit against McClatchy after the company declared bankruptcy in 2020 and was sold to Chatham Asset Management. It would be difficult to recover any alleged damages from the trust of a bankrupt company, and he cannot sue Chatham over a story published before it owned the newspaper.
A Virginia judge dismissed the remainder of Nunes’ lawsuit against Mair, but allowed Nunes’ lawyer, Steven Biss, to file an amended complaint. Mair has moved to dismiss it, but it is still pending in court.
Ryan Lizza and Esquire
Allegations: Journalist Ryan Lizza wrote an article for Esquire that detailed Nunes’ family moving a dairy to Iowa from California. The 2018 article said it was possible that the Nunes’ dairy relied on undocumented immigrants for labor, a common practice in the industry. Nunes does not have a financial stake in the dairy, which is owned by his parents and brother.
Nunes sued Lizza and the owner of Esquire in September 2019 in the District Court for the Northern District of Iowa.
Status: A federal judge in Iowa dismissed the case in August 2020, agreeing with arguments by Lizza and Hearst, the company that owns Esquire, that Nunes failed to state a claim over which he could actually sue for defamation.
The judge said the parts of the article that Nunes had specified were defamatory did not harm the congressman, were opinions or did not actually concern Nunes.
Nunes appealed the decision shortly after the dismissal. It is pending with the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Fake farmer allegation
Allegations: Nunes sued a retired farmer in his district and Democratic groups that had accused Nunes of being a “fake farmer” during the 2018 election. Nunes described himself as a farmer on the ballot. Nunes was raised in a dairy family, but he did not report earning any income from farming at the time.
Retired farmer Paul Buxman, aided by Democratic groups, challenged Nunes’ ballot designation and lost, with a court ruling that Nunes could continue to call himself a farmer in 2018. Nunes’ campaign then sued Buxman and the groups who helped him in August 2019 in Tulare County Superior Court.
Status: Nunes’ campaign dropped the lawsuit voluntarily a month after filing it. It was one of only two lawsuits Nunes filed in California, which has strict laws discouraging unmeritorious lawsuits that can chill free speech, known as anti-SLAPP laws.
Fusion GPS
Allegations: Nunes in federal court sued the investigative research firm Fusion GPS — best known for its role in compiling the so-called Steele dossier of intelligence leads concerning President Donald Trump — and progressive watchdog group Campaign for Accountability in September 2019. He alleged they engaged in a “joint and systematic effort to intimidate, harass, threaten, influence, interfere with, impede, and ultimately to derail” his work as chariman of the House Intelligence Committee.
Status: A judge dismissed the case in February 2020, and then Nunes filed an amended complaint against Fusion GPS in April that excluded Campaign for Accountability from the lawsuit.
The judge in dismissing the case wrote Nunes’ complaint “includes many rote statements of law and conclusory allegations which fall short of meeting” legal standards determined by the Supreme Court,”
Fusion GPS moved to dismiss the amended complaint. That motion is still pending.
First Washington Post lawsuit
Allegations: Nunes sued The Post over a December 2019 article that said Nunes had informed President Trump about a briefing given to members of the House Intelligence Committee. According to the article, the official who delivered the briefing said Russia preferred that Trump win the 2020 presidential election.
Status: A judge in the District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the lawsuit in December, saying Nunes had failed to state a claim that rose to the level of defamation.
Nunes filed to appeal that ruling shortly after the dismissal.
CNN
Allegations: Nunes filed a lawsuit against CNN in December 2019, alleging the broadcast network published a “demonstrably false hit piece” when it reported a claim that Nunes had traveled to Vienna to meet with Ukrainian officials digging up political dirt on President Joe Biden.
CNN reported that Nunes refused to speak with them. Nunes released photos when he sued the company showing he was not in Vienna at the time CNN’s source said he traveled there.
Status: A judge in the District Court for the Southern District of New York dismissed the lawsuit last week, saying Nunes was subject to a California law that required him to seek a retraction of the story or allege sufficiently special damages before filing a lawsuit. Nunes had never sought a retraction.
Nunes has not yet filed an appeal, but he still has time to do so.
Second Washington Post lawsuit
Allegations: Nunes in November filed a second lawsuit against The Washington Post in federal court, alleging the newspaper defamed him by including false allegations against him in a story published that month. The story was about the selection of Michael Ellis to be the top lawyer at the National Security Agency. Ellis was former chief counsel to Nunes.
Nunes took issue with two paragraphs in the story reporting that Ellis was involved with Nunes’ so-called “midnight run.” That refers to a trip Nunes took to the White House in March 2017, where reportedly obtained information he used at a press conference days later to suggest the FBI inappropriately conducted surveillance on Trump’s 2016 campaign.
In the legal complaint, Nunes says the midnight run “never happened” and that he “never made a ‘surreptitious visit to the White House grounds’ in March 2017.”
Nunes has told author Lee Smith that the midnight run actually took place in daylight, and that he went to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House grounds where “I got my hands on the documents I was looking for and the next morning briefed (former House) Speaker (Paul) Ryan on it.”
Status: That lawsuit was moved to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia earlier this week, another setback for Nunes who had fought the move to the D.C. court. His other lawsuit against The Washington Post had been moved to the same court before a judge dismissed it.
Twitter and Washington man
Allegations: Nunes sued Twitter — again — and a resident of the state of Washington who previously lived in Nunes’ district in October. Nunes alleges Benjamin Meredith stalked and threatened him online through Twitter.
In the complaint filed in Tulare County Superior Court in October, Nunes says Meredith, “runs a network of anonymous Twitter accounts that stalk (Nunes) 24 hours, every day.” Nunes says the accounts have posted “thousands” of comments threatening him, posting his personal information and encouraging others to harass him. He has not specified the tweets or accounts at issue.
Status: Nunes dropped Twitter from the lawsuit voluntarily but is continuing to sue Meredith. Meredith’s attorney, Brian Whelan, moved to dismiss the suit under California’s anti-SLAPP laws discouraging frivolous lawsuits.
Whelan also had the case moved to federal court in January, where it is pending.
This story was originally published February 26, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
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