Weyrich v. The New Public

• Decision Date: 05 January 2001
• Docket Number: No. 99-7221,99-7221
• Citation: 235 F.3d 617,344 U.S.App.D.C. 245
• Parties: (D.C. Cir. 2001) Paul Weyrich, Appellant v. The New Republic, Inc., et al., Appellees
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

Page 617

235 F.3d 617 (D.C. Cir. 2001)

Paul Weyrich, Appellant v. The New Republic, Inc., et al., Appellees

No. 99-7221

United States Court of Appeals FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued October 11, 2000

Decided January 5, 2001

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (No. 99cv01213)

Larry Klayman argued the cause and filed the briefs for appellant.

Andrew H. Marks argued the cause for appellees. With him on the brief were Clifton S. Elgarten and Stuart H. Newberger.

Before: Edwards, Chief Judge, Rogers, Circuit Judge, and Silberman, Senior Circuit Judge.

Opinion for the Court filed by Chief Judge Edwards.

Harry T. Edwards Chief Judge:

Appellant Paul Weyrich appeals from an order of the District Court dismissing his suit for defamation, false light invasion of privacy, and civil conspiracy to defame. Weyrich's complaint asserts that he was defamed by an article, "Robespierre of the Right--What I Ate at the Revolution," authored by David Grann and published by The New Republic on October 27, 1997. The article is flowered with anecdotes that reveal Weyrich to be both emotionally volatile and short-tempered, and it depicts him as both a zealoted political extremist and an easily-enraged tyrant of the first order.

Weyrich complains that the article oversteps the bounds of protected political commentary by attributing to him, as its central theme, the diagnosable mental condition of paranoia. He further contends that, in presenting its overall picture of mental instability, the piece relies on false and misleading anecdotes, as well as two defamatory caricatures. The District Court disagreed and granted appellees' motion to dismiss Weyrich's complaint in its entirety prior to discovery.

We reject Weyrich's claim that the article attributes to him a diagnosable mental illness. "Paranoia" is used in the article as a popular, not clinical, term, to embellish the author's view of Weyrich's political zealotry and intemperate nature. The author's musings on these scores are protected political commentary, for, in context, it is clear that his comments are meant only to deride Weyrich's political foibles and, relatedly, to attack what the author sees as the inability of the conservative movement "to accept the compromising nature of power." In short, these comments cannot reasonably be understood as verifiably false, and, therefore potentially actionable, assertions of mental derangement.

There are other segments of the article, however, that may extend beyond protected commentary. Accepting the facts as alleged in the complaint, as we must, it appears that some of the anecdotes reported in the article are reasonably capable of defamatory meaning and arguably place Weyrich in a false light that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person. Thus, because we find that some of the article's contested statements are both verifiable and reasonably capable of defamatory meaning, at least a portion of the complaint is sufficient to survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss. We are therefore constrained to reverse and remand the case for further proceedings.

I. Background

A. The Article

The cover of the October 27, 1997 issue of The New Republic carries a caricatured and smiling Paul Weyrich leaning against a guillotine, arms crossed and wearing the square-buckled shoes of a puritan. The disembodied heads of conservative politicians--Newt Gingrich, Fred Thompson and others--litter the ground, each donning wide-eyed looks of consternation and disbelief. Just left of the scene, the cover reads "Robespierre of the Right--Paul Weyrich and the Conservative Quest for Purity." Between the covers of the cited issue of the magazine is the disputed article that is the subject of this law suit. See David Grann, Robespierre of the Right--What I Ate at the Revolution, The New Republic, Oct. 27 1997, at 20 (hereinafter "Article"). The five-page article purports to offer a brief story of appellant's life as a leading member of the conservative movement over the past 30 years. The article poses Weyrich as a symbol of the movement. And the author postulates that, because of its uncompromising character, the movement has torn apart and destabilized a Republican party it helped to create.

At the outset of the article, Grann offers a justification for the piece: "If Weyrich were the only conservative purging Republicans, he would be no more than an interesting character--a minor, albeit compelling, player in the history of the conservative movement. Yet, he has become, in many respects, a case study of the conservative mind." Article, at 20. Grann then dedicates the first part of the article to appellant's role in the rise of populist conservatives to national prominence in the 1970s. The article catalogs Weyrich's various leadership roles in the ideological movement: from founding the Conservative Lunch Club of Capitol Hill, to launching the Heritage Foundation, to establishing the Free Congress Foundation, appellant helped grow the movement at every stage--even coining the term "moral majority."

The article's description of appellant takes a decided turn, however, when the story moves to the period beginning with the inauguration of Ronald Reagan: "By 1981, while his friends were still basking in their newfound power, Weyrich began to experience sudden bouts of pessimism and paranoia--early symptoms of the nervous breakdown that afflicts conservatives today." Article, at 22 (emphasis added). Thereafter, the remainder of the article reveals appellant to be an uncompromising, vengeful, and often tyrannical "symbol" of the conservative movement. He engineers the downfall of John Tower. Id. He accuses Senator Orrin Hatch of having "psychological problems." Id. at 19. He distances himself from Newt Gingrich, who, he says, "does not have any immutable principles that he would die for," and Trent Lott, who he describes as "the greatest disappointment of my life." Id. at 24 (emphasis in original).

The article relays the following notable episode:

By the 1988 presidential campaign, Weyrich was even more disillusioned. When the Bush camp refused to meet with a group of Afghani resistance fighters, Weyrich conspired to hide them in an adjoining room when Dan Quayle turned up for a luncheon hosted by the Free Congress Foundation; the plan was to spring them on the unsuspecting Quayle. But at the last minute, Bill Pascoe, Bush's liaison to the Beltway conservatives, leaked the plot, and Weyrich snapped. "Suddenly there was a volcano of screaming," recalls one lobbyist in the room. "Weyrich was calling Bill a traitor. He was spitting and frothing at the mouth. We were ready to get him a room right next to Hinckley." When the yelling stopped, Weyrich dispatched a letter to Pascoe's fiancee, questioning Pascoe's loyalty and implying that he was unfit for marriage.

Id. at 22. On the page opposite this vignette, there appears a second caricature, this time depicting appellant in a tie and suspenders, feeding on a skewer of charred bodies. Its portrayal of appellant echoes Grann's comparison of appellant to conservatives generally: "Since taking power in 1994, conservatives have gorged even by their standards. They have savaged Dole, ravaged Gingrich, plumped up and then devoured Lott. They have shut down the government they spent decades trying to fill. They have, in short, acted as nutty as Weyrich." Id. at 22. The piece calls this tendency "Weyrichism," referring to "the kind of rhetoric that brands one's own people apostates when they make some of the compromises that power inevitably demands." Id.

Grann then details appellant's latest project, a conservative cable channel known as National Empowerment Television ("NET"): "Launched in 1993 with a budget of roughly $10 million, it was supposed to be Weyrich's masterwork: the first ideologically driven public affairs network in America, a kind of third-wave Pravda." Id. at 23. The article describes the network as a 24-hour vehicle, both on and off screen, for Weyrich's conservatism. Not only did he host many of the shows, he "even imposed ideological litmus tests on stagehands and secretaries. The result, staffers say, was sound technicians who could spout the pro-life line but not plug in the microphone." Id. Grann notes that "[o]ne reporter says he was nearly fired for getting a response from the Clinton administration about a scandal; he recalls how, when a guest blurted out on air that he was gay, Weyrich became apoplectic. 'Why should I be ashamed?' Weyrich says. 'I want people on a mission.' " According to the article, appellant eventually transformed the station into a self-contained fiefdom:

More and more isolated, Weyrich now surrounds himself with a coterie of sycophants who, aides say, have little understanding of television and who patrol the corridors maintaining ideological discipline. His inner circle con sists mainly of family members who receive handsome salaries for their services: one son is in charge of coalition luncheons; another produces "Morning View" on NET; his daughter is vice president for development.

Weyrich also increasingly relies on Bill Lind, a kind of minister of culture who hosts "Next Revolution" each week, always wearing what appears to be the same black turtleneck. Lind's own Manichaean ideology has only encouraged Weyrich.

Id. at 24.

"As they had back home in Wisconsin," the article reports, "people in Washington soon crossed to the other side of the street when they saw Weyrich coming. Gingrich, who had anchored two shows, declined to sign another contract. Lott revoked the special Senate parking privileges Weyrich had gotten after a car accident. GOP Senator John McCain of Arizona refused even to talk to him. 'We know,' says Senator Orrin Hatch, 'who has the psychological problems.' " Id. By 1996, the network had run into financial...