The Nebraska Supreme Court on Friday revived a lawsuit brought against the Nebraska Republican Party over political mailers in a hotly contested race for a state legislative seat in 2020.
"When the facts presented by the candidate are viewed in a light most favorable to the candidate ... those facts are sufficient that a jury could find by clear and convincing evidence that the party acted with actual malice," Justice John Freudenberg wrote.
He said a jury also might find that Janet Palmtag, the candidate, had not met the elements of public figure defamation. Because there is a genuine issue of material fact, the court reversed the lower court's dismissal in favor of the Republican Party.
The case dates back to 2020, when Palmtag, a Nebraska City real estate broker, ran for the District 1 seat seeking to represent five counties in Southeast Nebraska in the State Legislature.
Although she was a registered Republican, the Nebraska Republican Party backed another Republican, her opponent, state Sen. Julie Slama, who was first appointed to the seat by then-Gov. Pete Ricketts in 2018, and ultimately won reelection in 2020 with 68% of the vote.
At issue in the case were two mailers the Nebraska GOP sent voters in October 2020 saying Palmtag had "broke the law & lost her real estate license," neither of which were true.
When Palmtag demanded a correction, the state GOP refused and she ultimately filed the suit alleging she had been defamed and her business suffered as a result.
Her attorney, David Domina, argued the Republican Party made "intentional, reckless and false statements" to smear Palmtag's reputation and integrity.
He said she hadn't broken the law. The Iowa Real Estate Commission fined her company $500 due to a technical oversight in a sale by another agent. She voluntarily changed her Iowa license status to inactive because she wasn't doing much business there and didn't want to pay the annual renewal fee.
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In December 2022, Lancaster County District Judge Andrew Jacobsen agreed that the GOP's flyer contained "not substantially true" statements about Palmtag. But he found that she couldn't prove actual malice, the legal standard to recover damages in a libel suit involving a public figure.
In other words, she couldn't prove the GOP knew it was false or showed a reckless disregard for the truth.
She appealed, arguing that was a question for a jury. On Friday, the Supreme Court agreed.
In the opinion, Freudenberg wrote that "questions of motive and intent are particularly inappropriate for summary judgment."
He said there was sufficient evidence to present a genuine issue of whether the Republican Party had acted with actual malice, referring in part to a text thread about the mailers telling then-executive director Ryan Hamilton: "Ok that's not real."
The judge said the Republican Party's attorneys didn't even attempt to explain how the information had been ambiguous. The website plainly referred to the license status of J.J. Palmtag Inc. being canceled and nowhere referred to Janet Palmtag.
Freudenberg said: "A reasonable fact finder could find the party’s attestations of innocence disingenuous."
He said it also could find they'd made the false and defamatory statements knowing they were likely false or despite serious doubts they were true.
"Or a reasonable fact finder might reject all of those interpretations," he said.
The case now will go back to Lancaster County District Court.
Our state continues to hemorrhage our youth. For some reason they don’t find this state attractive. Our government tries so hard to make it that way.
When parents are unable to make decisions for their children, women are unable to make decisions concerning their own bodies, refusing federal subsidies to feed poor children, tax codes that favor the rich and burden the poor, laws that promote gun access which endangers our citizens, laws that criminalize the use of marijuana, refusing to support higher education and allow those who can afford private schools tax breaks, ignoring the will of the people by undermining petitions, allowing unscrupulous businesses to poison communities and threaten water supplies ...
What would be their incentive to stay? Maybe our state motto makes sense. Nebraska, it’s not for everyone.
While Attorney General Hilgers has shown great skill at legislating on behalf of executive priorities, I prefer my elected representative — state senators — to do the lawmaking.
Hilgers has already successfully steered the Legislature away from its oversight mission by defanging inspectors general offices via his "non-binding" opinion on the offices' originating legislation. No law was changed, but the access to two executive-run agencies is now limited.
Next, we were treated to the slathering of First Amendment legal theories on Second Amendment yearnings, as expressed in another "non-binding" opinion by AG Hilgers on the reach of Sen. Tom Brewer's ill-advised concealed carry law. As Hilgers sees it, Supreme Court opinions that limit the government's ability to prohibit speech in "quintessentially public" spaces also apply to limiting guns in those spaces.
Uh, no.
Urban senators, I support the mayors of Lincoln and Omaha and their police forces on sensible guardrails around Sen. Brewer's Wild West fantasy. You should too. It's time to defend the text of the law from "non-binding" opinions that obscure it.
Now, Hilgers wishes to insert himself in the ongoing legislative debate over cannabis prohibitions. Because why not? The Nebraska courts have signaled that even the people themselves, via their so-called petition rights, are powerless to break that conservative taboo.
Like they say, nature abhors a vacuum. Perhaps it especially abhors a power vacuum. Senators need to get it together on behalf of us, the increasingly powerless public.
The new year is beginning, so it is time to turn the page. And, turning that new page should include a change in leadership in the 3rd Congressional District in Nebraska, i.e., replace Rep. Adrian Smith.
His vote not to expel George Santos, the disgraced congressperson from New York, is inexcusable. Smith’s reasoning (excuse) was that an expulsion vote sets a dangerous precedent.
I put forth that Smith’s vote sets a more dangerous precedent. His vote, along with the other members who voted not to expel Santos, condones Santos’s disgraceful and criminal behavior. Santos faces 23 federal charges including fraud and identity theft. No serious person defends Santos's behavior, yet Smith’s vote does just that.
Smith claims he represents Nebraska values, but his vote does not represent our values of honesty and integrity.
Therefore, it is time for a change in the 3rd District. I hope that someone in the district, someone who more accurately represents our Nebraska values, will challenge the congressman in the primary election and then be elected in the general election in November.
The congressman’s leadership has failed the 3rd District and his vote not to expel the New York congressman is just one example of his failures.
Red Way’s mismanagement of funds was a disappointment. The innovation that the Lincoln Airport leadership has demonstrated is a success.
For many years Lincoln’s airport languished and felt like it was slowly fading. The leadership from Dave Haring and the elected officials on the Airport Authority has turned things around. They found a way forward in renovating the airport and creating more community spaces and engagement.
We got here because of the creativity and innovation that is leading the change. I worked for many years in the world of entrepreneurs and startups. The first lesson that you learn is that mistakes are going to happen, and you don’t find big successes without taking risks.
LNK leadership has already accomplished big things. While COVID could have been crippling, LNK found a way to host Offutt Air Base while its runway was being rebuilt. They have worked to innovate the way that people interact with the airport offering community events and helping nonprofits.
LNK is partnering with the National Air Guard to rebuild a runway that provides unique opportunities for Lincoln’s aviation industry. Duncan Aviation continues to grow jobs here in Lincoln as they expand their business and their facilities. With the success of the Aviation Focus Program at Lincoln North Star High School, we need to keep those talented youth in Lincoln.
I’m glad we have the leadership and experience here at LNK to grow into the future.
Thank you Patty Pansing Brooks for your poem ("The slight before Christmas," Dec. 29). What a clever way to shine the light on the dissimulation of that one line by Gov. Jim Pillen: "I don't believe in welfare."
The true hypocrisy is indeed the lack of empathy for innocent children while doling out "welfare" to the rich in the form of tax cuts.
I, too, have looked in his eyes, and what I saw was pride. His pride will not allow him to accept help from an administration led by Joe Biden. If the funds were coming from the former, disgraced administration, he would be first in line for the assistance.
One has to put the proverbial shoe on the other foot; what would he do if it were a Republican administration offering this assistance?
Swallow your pride, governor. He should have done what's right for disadvantaged children.
Gov. Jim Pillen has proposed raising the sales tax by 2 cents, which would make Nebraska's sales tax the highest in the nation. Although the details have not been released, the governor's office suggests this would drop the property tax from the highest in the nation to 27th.
All that does is switch taxes from one class of taxpayers to another, not all of whom are even Nebraska farmers or ranchers. People of wealth own much property, while people of less wealth own very little property. And if they rent they get no break for property tax.
The sales tax is considered regressive as it takes a larger percentage of income from low-income taxpayers rather than from high-income taxpayers. Most recent federal and state changes in taxes have not helped middle- or lower-income persons, and this proposal would not help those folks, either.
If one examines who owns property in Nebraska there are many acres of farm and ranch land that are owned by very wealthy persons, organizations or foreigners. According to the USDA/FSA, Ted Turner owns more than 500,000 acres, the Mormon Church owns 370,000 acres, and Bill Gates owns 20,585 acres. Canadians own 593,305 acres of Nebraska.
Pillen Family Farms owns 30,000 acres of farmland.
Dave Kirby in his Dec. 31 letter to the editor asks, "How many is enough?" referring to the immigration crisis and placing the blame for it on the Biden Administration.
I, too, ask how many is enough? How many criminal indictments does it take to render a former president unfit for elective office? How many provable lies are enough to disqualify a person for running for elective office? How many calls to violence and retribution inciting well-meaning and otherwise intelligent people to criminal acts and threats against public officials are enough to prove intent to subvert the United States Constitution?
To those who voted for Trump, what level of criminality is enough?
I was born in Norfolk. I follow Nebraska closely. I live in Houston, Texas, home of strip clubs and oil business. So believe me when I say taxing petroleum products going through your state is more lucrative than taxing attendees to strip clubs or strip clubs themselves.
Here's an idea for Sen. Barry DeKay: Tax both. This strip club tax would have been a waste of Nebraskans' time and money.Â
Theater and concert ticket prices are out of control. The performing arts are almost exclusively for the rich.
As a young adult I could afford most concerts I wanted to attend. My first rock concert in 1977 featured three bands for $10. At US ’83 it was $37.50 for a three-day pass. That’s about $120 today — a bargain for three days and roughly three dozen bands.
I saw concert tickets recently ranging from $500 to $7,000. Wow. My daughter-in-law said five years ago she could afford concerts for her oldest daughter; five years later with her youngest, it’s impossible.
And cheap seats for an upcoming musical are $160. It’s just too much.
Concerts today rely more on technology: light shows, video screens, backup dancers, etc. Theatre, too, utilizes more bells and whistles than it used to. Do we really need all of that? Isn’t the art itself enough? Most real artists just want to be heard.
The arts used to be for everyone. It is a tragedy that only the wealthy can afford them now. The ancient Greeks included the humanities in their educational paradigm — the model upon which American education is based — because exposure to the arts keeps us in touch with our basic humanity.
Maybe more access to the arts could help Americans not be so angry with each other all the time. But I guess we can’t afford that.
American helped create NATO more than 70 years ago with the goal of preventing an attack from the Soviet Union/Russia. When the Russian attack came, the hammer fell on a country outside that alliance. Ukraine indeed took the entire brunt of the invasion, resisted, and turned the tide.
In so doing, Ukraine destroyed so much Russian equipment that a Russian attack on NATO is now highly improbable. With the blood of tens of thousands soldiers, Ukrainians defended every member of our alliance, making it far less likely that America would have to go to war in Europe.
Sadly, many Republicans (and a few Democrats) are willing to sell them out. The far right has prioritized culture war fears (especially immigrants) over Russia's bombs and missiles. If these priorities win and Ukraine falls, we will be creating actual disasters: Even more dramatic death and destruction in Ukraine, including genocide. Diminished food supply for the world. International instability as the Chinese decide an offensive against Taiwan is plausible. Russia and China will feel embolden to undermine democracy around the world.
Conservatives/Republicans need to ask themselves if/why they are willing to accept these outcomes. None of Nebraska’s congressional members have challenged those who prioritize bigotry over national defense. Maybe Nebraska’s voters need to call their offices and give them some backbone.
Yes, we must address immigration. But sabotaging Ukraine will only make things worse.
Gov. Jim Pillen's decision not to apply for federal funding for children's summer food programs is short-sighted in dealing with fiscal responsibility. It was estimated that to manage the $18 million in aid it would cost $300,000. That leaves more than $17 million that would be spent in our urban and rural communities.
That purchasing power would then be multiplied and spread across those communities. All residents would benefit. His supposed support of children and this decision suggest hypocrisy.
No doubt some of those funds would have been spent buying pork products. But then again the Nebraskans that continue to vote for their politicians don't connect their neighbors' welfare with their own welfare.
Gov. Jim Pillen's refusal to apply for more than $18 million in federal funds to help feed our less fortunate children only proves two things: 1) He's even worse of a governor than Jiminy Ricketts, and 2) he's not "pro-life" at all. He's just "pro-fetus."
Assuming he considers himself a Christian, he is, sadly, falling far short of what any actual Christian would do.
An article in the Dec. 26 issue of the Journal Star indicates that a primary focus in the 2024 session of the Nebraska Legislature will be to address the matter of workforce development.
A group formed by Gov. Jim Pillen identified four focus areas to address the problem of a shortage of workers in Nebraska. They were housing, child care, education and incentives.
While these may be important, a glaring omission is the lack of good public transportation in Nebraska, which would make our workforce more mobile and better able to meet employment needs statewide.
A key tool would be the establishment of commuter rail service between Lincoln and Omaha. This train service would allow workers without cars to go where the jobs are.
Part and parcel of this would be expansion of StarTran, the public bus system in Lincoln, and Metra, the public bus system in Omaha.
Officials at American Job Service in Lincoln report that the single biggest barrier to people placing in jobs is lack of transportation. If willing workers can’t get there, they won’t be hired.
Bills to start commuter rail between Lincoln and Omaha have languished in the Legislature for several sessions. In addition to other benefits commuter rail would provide, it can overcome the transportation barrier.
It is hoped that Pillen and state senators will see the wisdom in and necessity for commuter rail and will pass legislation in this session to make it happen.
Our state continues to hemorrhage our youth. For some reason they don’t find this state attractive. Our government tries so hard to make it that way.
When parents are unable to make decisions for their children, women are unable to make decisions concerning their own bodies, refusing federal subsidies to feed poor children, tax codes that favor the rich and burden the poor, laws that promote gun access which endangers our citizens, laws that criminalize the use of marijuana, refusing to support higher education and allow those who can afford private schools tax breaks, ignoring the will of the people by undermining petitions, allowing unscrupulous businesses to poison communities and threaten water supplies ...
What would be their incentive to stay? Maybe our state motto makes sense. Nebraska, it’s not for everyone.
While Attorney General Hilgers has shown great skill at legislating on behalf of executive priorities, I prefer my elected representative — state senators — to do the lawmaking.
Hilgers has already successfully steered the Legislature away from its oversight mission by defanging inspectors general offices via his "non-binding" opinion on the offices' originating legislation. No law was changed, but the access to two executive-run agencies is now limited.
Next, we were treated to the slathering of First Amendment legal theories on Second Amendment yearnings, as expressed in another "non-binding" opinion by AG Hilgers on the reach of Sen. Tom Brewer's ill-advised concealed carry law. As Hilgers sees it, Supreme Court opinions that limit the government's ability to prohibit speech in "quintessentially public" spaces also apply to limiting guns in those spaces.
Uh, no.
Urban senators, I support the mayors of Lincoln and Omaha and their police forces on sensible guardrails around Sen. Brewer's Wild West fantasy. You should too. It's time to defend the text of the law from "non-binding" opinions that obscure it.
Now, Hilgers wishes to insert himself in the ongoing legislative debate over cannabis prohibitions. Because why not? The Nebraska courts have signaled that even the people themselves, via their so-called petition rights, are powerless to break that conservative taboo.
Like they say, nature abhors a vacuum. Perhaps it especially abhors a power vacuum. Senators need to get it together on behalf of us, the increasingly powerless public.
The new year is beginning, so it is time to turn the page. And, turning that new page should include a change in leadership in the 3rd Congressional District in Nebraska, i.e., replace Rep. Adrian Smith.
His vote not to expel George Santos, the disgraced congressperson from New York, is inexcusable. Smith’s reasoning (excuse) was that an expulsion vote sets a dangerous precedent.
I put forth that Smith’s vote sets a more dangerous precedent. His vote, along with the other members who voted not to expel Santos, condones Santos’s disgraceful and criminal behavior. Santos faces 23 federal charges including fraud and identity theft. No serious person defends Santos's behavior, yet Smith’s vote does just that.
Smith claims he represents Nebraska values, but his vote does not represent our values of honesty and integrity.
Therefore, it is time for a change in the 3rd District. I hope that someone in the district, someone who more accurately represents our Nebraska values, will challenge the congressman in the primary election and then be elected in the general election in November.
The congressman’s leadership has failed the 3rd District and his vote not to expel the New York congressman is just one example of his failures.
Red Way’s mismanagement of funds was a disappointment. The innovation that the Lincoln Airport leadership has demonstrated is a success.
For many years Lincoln’s airport languished and felt like it was slowly fading. The leadership from Dave Haring and the elected officials on the Airport Authority has turned things around. They found a way forward in renovating the airport and creating more community spaces and engagement.
We got here because of the creativity and innovation that is leading the change. I worked for many years in the world of entrepreneurs and startups. The first lesson that you learn is that mistakes are going to happen, and you don’t find big successes without taking risks.
LNK leadership has already accomplished big things. While COVID could have been crippling, LNK found a way to host Offutt Air Base while its runway was being rebuilt. They have worked to innovate the way that people interact with the airport offering community events and helping nonprofits.
LNK is partnering with the National Air Guard to rebuild a runway that provides unique opportunities for Lincoln’s aviation industry. Duncan Aviation continues to grow jobs here in Lincoln as they expand their business and their facilities. With the success of the Aviation Focus Program at Lincoln North Star High School, we need to keep those talented youth in Lincoln.
I’m glad we have the leadership and experience here at LNK to grow into the future.
Thank you Patty Pansing Brooks for your poem ("The slight before Christmas," Dec. 29). What a clever way to shine the light on the dissimulation of that one line by Gov. Jim Pillen: "I don't believe in welfare."
The true hypocrisy is indeed the lack of empathy for innocent children while doling out "welfare" to the rich in the form of tax cuts.
I, too, have looked in his eyes, and what I saw was pride. His pride will not allow him to accept help from an administration led by Joe Biden. If the funds were coming from the former, disgraced administration, he would be first in line for the assistance.
One has to put the proverbial shoe on the other foot; what would he do if it were a Republican administration offering this assistance?
Swallow your pride, governor. He should have done what's right for disadvantaged children.
Gov. Jim Pillen has proposed raising the sales tax by 2 cents, which would make Nebraska's sales tax the highest in the nation. Although the details have not been released, the governor's office suggests this would drop the property tax from the highest in the nation to 27th.
All that does is switch taxes from one class of taxpayers to another, not all of whom are even Nebraska farmers or ranchers. People of wealth own much property, while people of less wealth own very little property. And if they rent they get no break for property tax.
The sales tax is considered regressive as it takes a larger percentage of income from low-income taxpayers rather than from high-income taxpayers. Most recent federal and state changes in taxes have not helped middle- or lower-income persons, and this proposal would not help those folks, either.
If one examines who owns property in Nebraska there are many acres of farm and ranch land that are owned by very wealthy persons, organizations or foreigners. According to the USDA/FSA, Ted Turner owns more than 500,000 acres, the Mormon Church owns 370,000 acres, and Bill Gates owns 20,585 acres. Canadians own 593,305 acres of Nebraska.
Pillen Family Farms owns 30,000 acres of farmland.
Dave Kirby in his Dec. 31 letter to the editor asks, "How many is enough?" referring to the immigration crisis and placing the blame for it on the Biden Administration.
I, too, ask how many is enough? How many criminal indictments does it take to render a former president unfit for elective office? How many provable lies are enough to disqualify a person for running for elective office? How many calls to violence and retribution inciting well-meaning and otherwise intelligent people to criminal acts and threats against public officials are enough to prove intent to subvert the United States Constitution?
To those who voted for Trump, what level of criminality is enough?
I was born in Norfolk. I follow Nebraska closely. I live in Houston, Texas, home of strip clubs and oil business. So believe me when I say taxing petroleum products going through your state is more lucrative than taxing attendees to strip clubs or strip clubs themselves.
Here's an idea for Sen. Barry DeKay: Tax both. This strip club tax would have been a waste of Nebraskans' time and money.Â
Theater and concert ticket prices are out of control. The performing arts are almost exclusively for the rich.
As a young adult I could afford most concerts I wanted to attend. My first rock concert in 1977 featured three bands for $10. At US ’83 it was $37.50 for a three-day pass. That’s about $120 today — a bargain for three days and roughly three dozen bands.
I saw concert tickets recently ranging from $500 to $7,000. Wow. My daughter-in-law said five years ago she could afford concerts for her oldest daughter; five years later with her youngest, it’s impossible.
And cheap seats for an upcoming musical are $160. It’s just too much.
Concerts today rely more on technology: light shows, video screens, backup dancers, etc. Theatre, too, utilizes more bells and whistles than it used to. Do we really need all of that? Isn’t the art itself enough? Most real artists just want to be heard.
The arts used to be for everyone. It is a tragedy that only the wealthy can afford them now. The ancient Greeks included the humanities in their educational paradigm — the model upon which American education is based — because exposure to the arts keeps us in touch with our basic humanity.
Maybe more access to the arts could help Americans not be so angry with each other all the time. But I guess we can’t afford that.
American helped create NATO more than 70 years ago with the goal of preventing an attack from the Soviet Union/Russia. When the Russian attack came, the hammer fell on a country outside that alliance. Ukraine indeed took the entire brunt of the invasion, resisted, and turned the tide.
In so doing, Ukraine destroyed so much Russian equipment that a Russian attack on NATO is now highly improbable. With the blood of tens of thousands soldiers, Ukrainians defended every member of our alliance, making it far less likely that America would have to go to war in Europe.
Sadly, many Republicans (and a few Democrats) are willing to sell them out. The far right has prioritized culture war fears (especially immigrants) over Russia's bombs and missiles. If these priorities win and Ukraine falls, we will be creating actual disasters: Even more dramatic death and destruction in Ukraine, including genocide. Diminished food supply for the world. International instability as the Chinese decide an offensive against Taiwan is plausible. Russia and China will feel embolden to undermine democracy around the world.
Conservatives/Republicans need to ask themselves if/why they are willing to accept these outcomes. None of Nebraska’s congressional members have challenged those who prioritize bigotry over national defense. Maybe Nebraska’s voters need to call their offices and give them some backbone.
Yes, we must address immigration. But sabotaging Ukraine will only make things worse.
Gov. Jim Pillen's decision not to apply for federal funding for children's summer food programs is short-sighted in dealing with fiscal responsibility. It was estimated that to manage the $18 million in aid it would cost $300,000. That leaves more than $17 million that would be spent in our urban and rural communities.
That purchasing power would then be multiplied and spread across those communities. All residents would benefit. His supposed support of children and this decision suggest hypocrisy.
No doubt some of those funds would have been spent buying pork products. But then again the Nebraskans that continue to vote for their politicians don't connect their neighbors' welfare with their own welfare.
Gov. Jim Pillen's refusal to apply for more than $18 million in federal funds to help feed our less fortunate children only proves two things: 1) He's even worse of a governor than Jiminy Ricketts, and 2) he's not "pro-life" at all. He's just "pro-fetus."
Assuming he considers himself a Christian, he is, sadly, falling far short of what any actual Christian would do.
An article in the Dec. 26 issue of the Journal Star indicates that a primary focus in the 2024 session of the Nebraska Legislature will be to address the matter of workforce development.
A group formed by Gov. Jim Pillen identified four focus areas to address the problem of a shortage of workers in Nebraska. They were housing, child care, education and incentives.
While these may be important, a glaring omission is the lack of good public transportation in Nebraska, which would make our workforce more mobile and better able to meet employment needs statewide.
A key tool would be the establishment of commuter rail service between Lincoln and Omaha. This train service would allow workers without cars to go where the jobs are.
Part and parcel of this would be expansion of StarTran, the public bus system in Lincoln, and Metra, the public bus system in Omaha.
Officials at American Job Service in Lincoln report that the single biggest barrier to people placing in jobs is lack of transportation. If willing workers can’t get there, they won’t be hired.
Bills to start commuter rail between Lincoln and Omaha have languished in the Legislature for several sessions. In addition to other benefits commuter rail would provide, it can overcome the transportation barrier.
It is hoped that Pillen and state senators will see the wisdom in and necessity for commuter rail and will pass legislation in this session to make it happen.