Recent court battles in Arkansas and California demonstrate how plaintiffs can weaponize the legal system to chill speech, even when the information at issue was disclosed by the government itself. Seth Stern director of advocacy for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, points out that both cases were classic strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs), yet their outcomes diverged because of the jurisdiction in which they were filed.
Understanding why these lawsuits mattered requires a look at the facts, the courts’ reasoning, and the broader constitutional backdrop that governs press freedom and public-record access.
Arkansas public-records dispute and the failed SLAPP
In early 2025, Jessica Kivell a healthcare worker and mother living in West Memphis, filed public-records requests with the Arkansas Public Service Commission. The commission supplied documents showing that Google would fund only one-third of a new solar plant intended to power its Henderson, Nev data center—a detail contradicting the company’s claim that ratepayers would bear no cost.
Kivell passed the files to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette which published a story based on the numbers. In response, Entergy Arkansas the utility slated to build the solar facility, sued Kivell, the Gazette, the newspaper’s reporter, and the Arkansas Times. The utility alleged that the commission erred by releasing the records, that they contained trade secrets and that the press should be barred from discussing them.
The lawsuit was swiftly dismissed by U.S. District Judge Lee Rudofsky who denied an emergency gag order and noted that the claims lacked legal merit. Although the judge’s decision forced the defendants to incur legal expenses and emotional strain, Arkansas law does offer an anti-SLAPP provision that allows prevailing parties to recover attorney fees. Unfortunately, because the case was heard in Federal court, the defendants could not tap that remedy.
Arkansas joins 39 other states and the District of Columbia with a statutory anti-SLAPP shield, yet the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has consistently refused to apply state anti-SLAPP statutes in federal filings. This jurisdictional gap leaves plaintiffs like Entergy free to file meritless suits that drain resources, even though the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected prior restraints on the press, most notably in Florida Star v. BJF where the Court held that a newspaper could not be punished for publishing information the government inadvertently released.
California surveillance-tech CEO vs. independent journalist
In 2023, independent reporter Jack Poulson of All-Source Intelligence published a piece about the 2021 domestic-violence arrest of Maury Blackman then chief executive of Premise Data a surveillance-technology firm contracted by the federal government. Poulson linked to the police report, which Blackman argued should have remained sealed because no charges were filed.
Blackman sued Poulson, the Substack platform that hosted the article, and other parties, seeking to have the story and the police report removed from the internet. The district court dismissed the suit as a SLAPP, citing the same First-Amendment precedents that protected Kivell’s case. An appellate panel upheld that dismissal last week, reaffirming California’s robust anti-SLAPP law and ordering Blackman to pay the defendants’ legal fees.
Unlike the Arkansas defendants, Poulson’s team could recover costs because California law expressly permits fee awards in successful anti-SLAPP motions. The case quickly garnered national attention, turning the attempted suppression into a public relations disaster for Blackman, whose attempt to scrub the record only amplified coverage across outlets from the San Francisco Chronicle to Courthouse News.
Why a federal anti-SLAPP law matters
The divergent outcomes in Arkansas and California highlight a structural problem: there is no federal statute providing a uniform anti-SLAPP shield. While 39 states have enacted their own protections, federal courts—especially in the 8th Circuit—often treat state anti-SLAPP statutes as incompatible with federal pleading standards. As a result, defendants in federal actions, like Kivell, cannot recover attorney fees, leaving them vulnerable to costly, meritless lawsuits.
Supreme Court precedent, including Florida Star v. BJF establishes that the government cannot impose liability on the press for inadvertently disclosed information. Yet without a federal anti-SLAPP law, plaintiffs can continue to file “strategic” complaints that force defendants to defend themselves, even when the underlying speech is protected. Lawmakers have repeatedly been urged to enact a nationwide shield that would allow swift dismissal of meritless suits and shift fee burdens to the filing party.
Until such legislation materializes, the pattern is likely to repeat: powerful corporations or individuals will test the limits of jurisdiction, hoping to find a court that refuses to apply state anti-SLAPP statutes. The result is a chilling effect on investigative reporting and on citizens exercising their right to access public records.
Both Kivell and Poulson ultimately emerged victorious on the merits, but the collateral damage—stress, lost time, and financial strain—underscores the urgent need for a federal remedy that protects speech regardless of the courtroom chosen.
