Bill Description: Senate Bill 1325 is an anti-SLAPP law, which would make it easier for defendants to quickly get lawsuits alleging defamation and other such charges dismissed. 

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NOTE: The constitutional arguments in favor of anti-SLAPP laws — designed to prevent lawsuits started with the intent to harass the defendant — likely outweigh the arguments against them. Still, it is worth noting that courts have used these laws to rule in favor of a far-left "journalist" who falsely claimed that One America News Network was "paid Russian propaganda," as well as radical environmentalist groups who made false claims about logging and energy companies. 

Protecting free speech is a noble goal, but anti-SLAPP laws should be carefully drafted so they do not eliminate all recourse for those who suffer defamation.

Does it violate the spirit or the letter of either the U.S. Constitution or the Idaho Constitution? Examples include restrictions on speech, public assembly, the press, privacy, private property, or firearms. Conversely, does it restore or uphold the protections guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution or the Idaho Constitution?

Senate Bill 1325 would create Chapter 37, Title 6, Idaho Code, which would be called the "Uniform Public Expression Protection Act." This would be an example of something commonly referred to as an anti-SLAPP law, which is an acronym for "Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation."

The law would apply to "a cause of action asserted in a civil action against a person based on the person's communication in a legislative, executive, judicial, administrative, or other governmental proceeding; communication on an issue under consideration or review in a legislative, executive, judicial, administrative, or other governmental proceeding; or exercise of the right of freedom of speech or of the press, the right to assemble or petition, or the right of association, guaranteed by the constitution of the United States or the constitution of the state of Idaho, on a matter of public concern."

This law would allow a party who "is served with a complaint, cross-claim, counterclaim, third-party claim, or other pleading that asserts a cause of action to which this chapter applies, or at a later time on a showing of good cause," to "file a special motion for expedited relief to dismiss the cause of action or part of the cause of action."

Upon the filing of this special motion, "all other proceedings between the moving party and responding party, including discovery and a pending hearing or motion, are stayed." 

The court is instructed to "dismiss with prejudice a cause of action, or part of a cause of action" if it falls under the provisions of this law. 

The bill says the law "shall be broadly construed and applied to protect the exercise of the right of freedom of speech and of the press, the right to assemble and petition, and the right of association, guaranteed by the constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of Idaho."

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