On Thursday, independent journalist Matt Taibbi initiated a $10 million defamation lawsuit against a Democratic congresswoman. He alleges that she wrongly accused him of sexual misconduct and promoted this accusation through her social media platforms.
Taibbi sued Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D., Calif.) sued in a New Jersey federal court after she referred to him as a "repeat sexual harasser" during a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee meeting on Tuesday concerning online censorship.
"These claims have been proven to be untrue and were made with genuine ill will—indicating either awareness of their untruthfulness or a careless indifference toward verifying their accuracy," as stated by Taibbi. lawsuit reads.
The accusations mirror earlier false statements that led to legal proceedings and numerous public retractions, all of which the defendant surely knew about, indicating their reckless disregard for the truth.
Kamlager-Dove censured Republicans at the beginning of the hearing For "promoting a serial sex harasser as their key witness." Although her comments during the hearing are safeguarded by the Speech and Debate Clause of the Constitution, Taibbi’s lawsuit contends that her public dissemination of these remarks online isn’t protected since it doesn’t pertain to her official legislative responsibilities.
Kamlager-Dove posted a transcript from her comments on her official congressional site and shared clips of her speech X and Bluesky , a platform dominated by liberals on social media.
After this, Republicans allowed Matt Taibbi some time to respond," she stated on X and Bluesky. "It’s noteworthy that he chose not to.
National Review reached out to Kamlager-Dove’s office for a statement.
Taibbi has never faced accusations or charges related to sexual harassment from any woman. The pieces the congressperson seems to reference detail a satirical section in a book he co-wrote about composing a Moscow nightlife guide during the 1990s in Russia.
The females mentioned in the passage have both been interviewed and verified that Taibbi did not sexually harass them. Multiple media organizations have revised their stories to address the passage, clarifying its satirical intent and eliminating incorrect claims regarding Taibbi.
“The defendant either knowingly made false statements or recklessly disregarded their accuracy, choosing to ignore previous legal actions and public corrections that refuted these claims—a fact she could not have been unaware of—and proceeded to repost the defamatory content on platforms like X, Bluesky, and her own website, all beyond the boundaries of her official responsibilities, with the clear intention of damaging the plaintiff’s reputation,” the lawsuit alleges.
Taibbi publishes Racket News He is prominent on Substack and is widely recognized for his coverage of the "Twitter Files." This refers to a collection of reports based on internal Twitter documents indicating that the platform deliberately marginalized conservative voices and downplayed the Hunter Biden laptop narrative before the 2020 presidential vote.
After acquiring the website with the intention of revitalizing free expression within it, billionaire Elon Musk handed over the documents to Taibbi and various independent reporters. Since then, Musk has relabeled it as X and implemented several modifications aimed at promoting open dialogue and retaining user engagement on the platform.
Prior to that, Taibbi worked as a seasoned political journalist for Rolling Stone Known for his investigative journalism and progressive viewpoint, Taibsi has consistently criticized the U.S. national security apparatus as well as the unfounded allegations regarding collusion between President Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russia.
Taibbi keeps reporting on internet censorship and how the federal government influences these platforms to curb certain expressions. His coverage includes extensive work on the State Department’s Global Engagement Center, which was at the center of the mentioned congressional hearings. Following Congress's decision not to finance it and restructuring it instead into a "hub" aimed at combating external meddling, the GEC was closed down by the State Department.
At the hearing, Taibbi called The GEC was referred to as a "fact-checking unit" and contended with allegations that it aimed to silence both leftist social media profiles and conservative news outlets.
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