Wilson Day Has Arrived.

Wilson v. Cable News Network, Inc., No. S239686 (Cal. Jul. 24, 2019)

Yesterday was a big day for California Civil Procedure, with the California Supreme Court handing down two decisions of procedural significance. I’ll address the second tomorrow.

But the first was the Court’s long-awaited anti-SLAPP decision in Wilson v. CNN. Wilson addresses the scope and meaning of Code of Civil Procedure § 425.16(e)(4)’s “other conduct in furtherance” element as applied to an employment discrimination claim. If you follow this kind of thing, you should read the whole opinion, which has tons of interesting anti-SLAPP discussion.

I have spent a lot of time thinking and writing about this (e)(4) issue over the past decade and a half, so sorry for the long post. Overall, Wilson is a good opinion with a generally correct result. I’m not sure I agree with every step of the Court’s analysis, but it’s navigating a very complicated space and nothing in its reasoning isn’t generally defensible under the text of 425.16 and the Court’s prior decisions. (Except for maybe footnote 7 . . . .) Anyway, I wanted to get this out quickly, so these are initial thoughts. If I had more time, I would have made it shorter.

The (e)(4) SLAPP Split Is Coming to a Head.

Wilson v. Cable News Network, No. B264944 (D2d1 Dec. 13, 2016)

This case is basically a retread of 2013’s Hunter v. CBS case. 

There, the Court of Appeal said that committing employment discrimination against a newscaster is “protected activity” under the anti-SLAPP statute because it is “conduct in furtherance” of First Amendment Activity as defined under Code of Civil Procedure § 425.16(e)(4). Except in this case the talent is off-air, and the discrimination (and retaliation) is on the basis of disability. Plus, it goes the other way.