Take it back or else!
He’ll sue! He’ll sue any damn scientists who say he’s bullshitting. He’ll sue them into oblivion!
Scott Atlas, a Trump coronavirus adviser, has threatened to sue a group of Stanford professors who wrote an open letter denouncing multiple public statement[s] Atlas has made about responding to Covid-19.
A letter from his lawyer said the professors’ statement “maliciously defames” Atlas and demanded the signers of the letters to withdraw their claims or be sued, according to Politico.
The open letter, which was published last Wednesday, said that Atlas’s statements and opinions “run counter to established science and, by doing so, undermine public-health authorities and the credible science that guides effective public health policy”. Over 100 faculty members with various medical expertise signed the letter.
I don’t think you can sue over that kind of thing. If you could there would be no such thing as peer review, because who would risk it?
In recent weeks, Atlas has raised concerns among public health experts by questioning the use of masks and embracing the controversial “herd immunity” response to the pandemic. Atlas was criticized for not having a background in public health or infectious diseases, as Trump’s former top advisors Deborah Birx and Anthony Fauci had.
Again – not a good candidate for a lawsuit. It’s not libel if it’s true, and it’s not libel if it’s evidence-based criticism.
Well, you can sue. You won’t win, but that’s not the point of these suits. Which is why any lawsuit filed against these Stanford professors will not be filed in California, or any other jurisdiction with an effective anti-SLAPP law.
Thank you. I wondered about that but went ahead anyway. But don’t frivolous suits often backfire, the way Yaniv’s did? Even in jurisdictions without anti-SLAPP laws?
I think they just rely on a settlement. A lot of these settle, if the one suing has enough money (usually a corporation) and the one being sued doesn’t. I mean, even a comfortable middle-class person can find it difficult to afford seeing such a lawsuit to completion.
Here, though, with an individual suing a group of professors, it might really backfire bad. Unless the school throws them under the bus.