COMMENTARY
This is an opinion piece. The views are my own.
The First Amendment guarantees five freedoms in one sentence: religion, speech, press, assembly, and the right “to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
The authors put them together for a reason. They knew the powerful would always prefer silence to scrutiny. So they made it the law of the land that citizens could speak, publish, and complain to their government without being punished for it.
There is a modern weapon designed to get around that promise. It’s called a SLAPP.
What a SLAPP is
SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation. The term was coined by two University of Denver professors, George Pring and Penelope Canan, who studied how people with money and power use courts to punish critics.
A SLAPP isn’t filed to win. It’s filed to hurt. The goal is to drag a critic into court, drain their bank account, consume their time, and send a message to everyone watching: speak up, and this will happen to you too.
The plaintiff doesn’t need a strong case. The process is the punishment.
Why it matters to you
You don’t have to be a journalist to be a target. Neighbors who object at a zoning meeting have been SLAPPed. So have people who wrote online reviews, testified before city councils, or filed complaints with regulators.
Every one of those acts is protected by the Constitution. And every one can be made expensive enough that ordinary people stop doing them.
That’s the real danger. A SLAPP doesn’t just silence the person sued. It silences everyone who decides it isn’t worth the risk.
How the law fights back
More than 30 states now have anti-SLAPP laws. Colorado passed its law in 2019. It lets a person who is sued over protected speech or petitioning file a special motion to dismiss early. The person who brought the case then has to show a reasonable likelihood of winning. If they can’t, the case is thrown out, and they can be ordered to pay the other side’s attorney fees.
Those protections exist because legislators in both parties recognized something simple: the courthouse door should not be a tool for shutting people up.
Why I’m writing this
I filed a complaint with the House Ethics Committee. That is petitioning the government, the very right the First Amendment names. One week later, I was in court defending myself against a protection order petition built in part on that complaint.
My attorneys have filed an anti-SLAPP motion. A judge will decide it. But the principle isn’t mine alone.
If a member of Congress can answer an ethics complaint by hauling the person who filed it into court, then the right to petition only belongs to people who can afford a lawyer. That isn’t the Constitution I learned about in Norwalk, Iowa, and it isn’t the one I’ll stop defending.
Speech that holds power to account is not a crime. It isn’t harassment. It’s the point.
DBW
Stand with me
Fighting a SLAPP costs real money, even when you’re right. Dan Ernst and Alan Feldman are defending this case in Weld County, and the next hearing is November 16.
If you believe the right to speak, publish, and petition the government belongs to everyone, not just people who can afford lawyers, please chip in to my legal defense fund. Every dollar goes to the fight.
Thank you.
David B. Wheeler
About the Author
David B. Wheeler is the president and co-founder of American Muckrakers, the Western North Carolina accountability organization best known for helping end Madison Cawthorn’s congressional career in 2022, the rare instance in modern politics of a sitting incumbent losing his own primary because somebody bothered to do the homework. Since then, American Muckrakers has turned its attention to Lauren Boebert, Ken Paxton, and a growing roster of politicians who confuse public office with a personal ATM. He publishes accountability journalism at Muckrakers.Today.
Wheeler co-hosts the MUCK YOU! podcast with Col. Moe Davis, the retired Air Force colonel and former chief prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay. He is the author of Color the Crooks, Case File #001: Lauren Boebert, the coloring book James Carville endorsed with the words “She earned every damn page. Buy it.” *He is also the founder of VoteROI.com, a political data company built on 86.9 million FEC records that helps donors figure out where their money actually goes, which, as this essay makes clear, is a question more people should be asking.
Before all that, Wheeler spent three decades in politics, elections, and event production in more than 50 countries on all seven continents. Along the way he lowered the Mississippi River, produced the first professional sports event ever held in Moscow, and produced the first marathon ever run on Antarctica. His political education started early: Page for the Iowa House of Representatives, intern in the United States Senate, and National Committeeman for Iowa on the Young Democrats of America national committee. David was the lead advance guy for then Senator Obama in Iowa City, Iowa, in October of 2006, and then again during his presidential announcement in Waterloo, Iowa, in February 2007. And, he has some good stories from both experiences.
An Iowa native and proud Hawkeye, Wheeler is a father of three and lives in the mountains of Western North Carolina, in the district Chuck Edwards is currently failing. He believes sunlight is the best disinfectant, filings don’t lie, and the loudest guy in the room is usually the one with the most to hide.
And, Beetlejuice Boebert claimed she was going to sue him. She never did, so David sued her in Federal Court in Denver and partially won.
Paid for by American Muckrakers PAC II (americanmuckrakers.com). Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee. Donations made to American Muckrakers, Inc. are not deductible for federal or state tax purposes.
This publication is First Amendment protected speech and commentary on matters of public concern. All individuals referenced are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law. No portion of this publication may be used for commercial purposes without the written consent of American Muckrakers PAC, Inc. and David B. Wheeler.
MUCH and MANY thanks, neighbor, for the work you do. Respect.
You are THE BEST💪💯Thank you.