The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a defamation lawsuit brought by D. James Kennedy Ministries against the Southern Poverty Law Center, which describes the evangelical Christian ministry as an “Anti-LGBT hate group.”
The court rejected hearing the case without comment. But Justice Clarence Thomas said in a three-page dissent that the court should have accepted the case.
At issue in the lawsuit was the “actual malice” standard established in the court’s landmark New York Times v. Sullivan defamation ruling of 1964. That standard says public figures must prove actual malice for a claim of defamation to proceed.