When TPM told McDevitt that a story detailing the lawsuit would be published today, he said, "You do so at your peril. Preserve all your notes, I'm going to send a litigation hold notice."
He added, "We will treat any republication of those allegations as libel and defamation. ... I say this on behalf of Mr. McMahon."
link: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/...
Undeterred, Talking Points Memo went ahead and printed the latest news story on the McMahon's history with WWE, involving Linda McMahon suing both a former female WWE employee who claimed that Vince McMahon sexually assaulted her, and media outlets who went public with the woman's story.
The amount of damages sought was $1 million.
Talking Points Memo gives some background on the suit:
On March 5, 1993, the WWE's principal outside counsel Jerry McDevitt and another attorney filed suit in federal district court in Connecticut on behalf of the McMahons. Named in the suit were Chatterton, Geraldo Rivera, the Tribune Entertainment Co. and The Investigative News Group. The McMahons asked for $50,000 in compensatory damages, $1 million in punitive damages and reimbursement of legal fees.
snip
According to the filing, Chatterton told Craig Rivera, Geraldo's brother and a reporter for the show, that McMahon had forced himself on her sexually. The filing states that Chatterton's comments were "making it clear to all viewers that her allegation was that McMahon had raped her." The McMahons asserted in the lawsuit that Chatterton's comments were false.
snip
McDevitt told TPM in an interview this week that the McMahons eventually dropped the lawsuit one year later so they could focus on the federal criminal charges brought against WWE and Vince McMahon involving steroids, a case in which WWE and McMahon were ultimately acquitted.
link: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/...
So, will the mere act of printing the above earn Talking Points Memo a lawsuit from a candidate who has been less than candid on all sorts of issues, from her stance on the minimum wage to the investigation of WWE launched by the state of Connecticut under the auspices of our Republican governor?
Or are the McMahons just threatening to sue independent journalists as a way of keeping damaging stories out of the public discourse?
Either prospect is chilling, and says more about what sort of people's representative Ms. McMahon would be than any number of glossy pieces of junk mail.
Journalists, bloggers and folks who just plain want to protect freedom of speech and freedom of the press should be rightly concerned when anyone running for public office threatens to sue an independent news and opinion outlet simply because they say things about a candidate that the candidate doesn't like, or run stories that a candidate would rather not address in the public square.
So, will the McMahons sue Talking Points Memo over this story?
Stay tuned...