A Florida circuit court has tossed out a lawsuit filed by an unsuccessful GOP state Senate candidate who alleged he was defamed by a Republican political committee that tried to tie his campaign donations to China.
Judge Dan Mosley of the Fifth Judicial Circuit Court in Lake County granted the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee’s motion for summary judgment on April 17 in the lawsuit filed last year by candidate Bowen Kou. The committee and its chairman, state Senate President Ben Albritton (R-Wauchula), were defendants in the case.
Kou was a candidate for state Senate District 13 during last year’s primary elections. After losing the primary to Keith Truenow, who garnered about two-thirds of the primary vote, Kou sued both the committee and Albritton, alleging that a mailer linking him to donors with ties to China contained false information, harmed his reputation and his grocery business, and was published with malice.
The plaintiff had sought $1 million in damages and a jury trial. But Mosley concluded Kou failed to back up his allegations with evidence despite the judge’s granting of a discovery period for the parties.
“Plaintiff Bowen Kou was required to provide evidence that establishes his defamation claim against defendants Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee and Sen. Ben Albritton,” Mosley said in his order. “Mr. Kou, however, failed to meet that burden.”
The only evidence Kou presented were hearsay and other statements made without personal knowledge, he said.
“None of them established the falsity, actual malice or damages defamation elements, nor did they prop up Mr. Kou’s main contention in this case: that FRSCC’s mailer against him falsely asserted that individuals with links to China donated to his campaign,” Mosley said in his order. “(Kou’s) five declarations contain no evidence on the citizenship of Mr. Kou’s donors, no evidence on FRSCC’s purported actual malice in creating and publishing the mailer, and no evidence on what damages Mr. Kou’s alleging in this case.”
But Anthony Sabatini, Kou’s attorney, criticized the decision, indicating that Kou had filed a motion for rehearing and that the committee had been ordered to respond in 10 days.
“The case was wrongly decided based primarily on the fact that a motion for summary judgment was premature,” Sabatini told the Florida Record in an email. “(The) defendants unlawfully refused discovery and used that as an excuse for ‘lack of evidence.’”
In his initial complaint, Kou characterized the defendant as “a dark-money political committee” that was financed by special interests and specialized in running attack ads against conservative Republicans during primary contests.
Mosley concluded that less than $32,000 of the nearly $197,000 Kou raised from individuals and entities during the election campaign came from Floridians. In addition, Kou acknowledged that some of his donors were born or raised in China – or were Chinese citizens.
“Mr. Kou even disclosed that one of his donors is a Chinese citizen herself (his cousin, Lijie Zhu), and he didn’t dispute that another identified donor (Jiawei Zhao) is a non-U.S. citizen,” the judge said in his decision.
Mosley also concluded that Kou’s litigation violated Florida’s statute barring strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPP), which protects people from litigation aimed at silencing their speech. In turn, the judge said the defendants were entitled to reasonable attorney fees and costs.