Sarah Palin Granted New Trial In Defamation Suit Against NY Times

(AP Photo/Ron Edmonds)

Former Republican Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin secured the right to a new trial in her high-profile defamation case against the New York Times on Wednesday.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Palin to allow her to retry her case concerning a 2017 editorial that falsely linked her to a 2011 mass shooting in Arizona that left six people dead and severely injured Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords .

The appellate court found that District Judge Jed Rakoff , who presided over the original February 2022 trial, committed several critical errors that compromised the proceedings.

A spokesperson for The New York Times told Mediaite, “This decision is disappointing. We’re confident we will prevail in a retrial.”

On Wednesday Circuit Judge John Walker , writing for the three-judge panel, stated that Rakoff “wrongly excluded evidence” that Palin believed demonstrated the Times’ “actual malice” in publishing the editorial. Furthermore, the panel noted that Rakoff improperly instructed the jury on the standard of proof required for the Times to be held liable.

An additional issue arose when jurors, during their deliberations, received news alerts on their mobile phones indicating that Rakoff intended to dismiss Palin’s case due to insufficient evidence of malice.

The editorial in question, called America’s Lethal Politics , was published following a 2017 shooting at a congressional baseball practice. It incorrectly suggested that a map circulated by Palin’s political action committee, which featured stylized crosshairs over certain districts, had incited the Arizona shooting. Though the Times quickly corrected the editorial, Palin argued that the damage had already been done.

Palin’s counsel, Ken Turkel , issued a statement to Mediaite on Wednesday, “Governor Palin is very happy with today’s decision, which is a significant step forward in the process of holding publishers accountable for content that misleads readers and the public in general. The truth deserves a level playing field, and Governor Palin looks forward to presenting her case to a jury that is ‘provided with relevant proffered evidence and properly instructed on the law’ as set forth in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals’ opinion.”

Diana Falzone contributed to this report.