In the Press

“Plaintiffs have been attempting to schedule depositions of the defendants for months. On the same day TGP filed for bankruptcy, we had just given notice for the depositions of [Gateway Pundit co-founders] Jim and Joe Hoft to be taken in May,” said Brittany Williams, a lawyer for the non-profit group Protect Democracy, which is representing Freeman and Moss.

Protect Democracy, the nonprofit representing Freeman and Moss, declined to comment on the bankruptcy announcement. The Gateway Pundit also settled a lawsuit from a former official at voting technology company Dominion Voting Systems, which was targeted by election fraud conspiracy theories in 2020.

“The new information landscape we’re in is a little bit like the Wild West — a lawless space,” said Ian Bassin, a co-founder of Protect Democracy. Lawyers, he said, have turned to defamation, which is legally defined as any false information, either published, broadcast or spoken, that harms the reputation of a person, business or organization. “It’s one of the most effective and only strategies for dealing with these out-and-out falsehoods,” Mr. Bassin said.

Jared Davidson, an attorney at Protect Democracy, which is representing Richer, said Lake’s maneuver suggested she was unable to defend herself.

“Given an opportunity to back up her claims in court, she has instead conceded she has no defense — effectively admitting that she spread lies about Mr. Richer and did so with ‘actual malice,’” Davidson said in a statement released on Tuesday. “The only thing left to do now is to determine the amount of the damage done to Mr. Richer as a result of Defendants’ misconduct.”

Richer and lawyers for Protect Democracy, a non-profit organization representing him, said Lake’s filing was essentially a surrender and claimed victory. “After months of doubling down and defending their lies across Arizona, in the media, and on social media, when push came to shove, the defendants decided to completely back down and concede that their lies were just that: lies,” Richer said in a statement.

Kari Lake, a prominent election denier running for a Senate seat in Arizona, has decided not to contest her liability in a defamation suit brought by a Republican election official in Maricopa County.

Stephen Richer, who presided over the county’s 2022 election, filed a defamation claim against Lake in June alleging that she “repeatedly and falsely accused” him of causing her electoral defeat in the race for governor won by Democrat Katie Hobbs.

Attorneys for Arizona Senate candidate Kari Lake moved to forfeit a defamation case against her Tuesday, choosing not to contest the allegations that she defamed a state election worker after the 2022 election.

“She has decided she cannot defend herself in this case despite continuously saying she has evidence,” said Ben Berwick, a lawyer at Protect Democracy with is among the firms representing Richer in the lawsuit against the candidate who failed in her 2022 run for Arizona governor.

“Let me be very clear, this filing may be full of legalese. It might be a bit confusing to read, it might be a bit opaque,” Jared Davidson, attorney for Richer, said. “But the takeaway and the legal effect could not be clearer. Ms. Lake is now refusing to defend the accusations that she made against Mr. Richer. She’s effectively admitting that she has no evidence to defend herself as it relates to the question of whether she defamed our client.”