I Feel a Little Less Alone in the Anti-SLAPP Universe

Nam v. Regents of the Univ. of Cal., No. C074796 (D3 Jul. 29, 2016)

A breath of fresh air in the anti-SLAPP arena. This is another case where an employer with a First Amendment-ish mission—here, a public university hospital that uses peer review—tries to pawn off alleged employment discrimination as “arising from protected activity” under the anti-SLAPP statute. It has happened before. And on more than one occasion it has worked. But this time the court isn’t buying it. Even better, the court here does a commendable job of tracing the line of cases back to the 2011 Tuszynska v. Cunningham decision’s misreading of a 2002 Supreme Court case that had begun to lose track of its roots and propagate through the case law like a virus.