Virginia’s conservative Liberty University today filed a $10 million defamation suit against the embattled New York Times for a “made up” and damaging story that falsely charged that students returning from spring break became infected with the coronavirus because the school stayed open.
In a 100-page suit, with exhibits, filed in Virginia’s Lynchburg Circuit Court, the 49-year-old school also charged that New York Times reporter Elizabeth Williamson and photographer Julia Rendleman ignored “No Trespassing” signs to tour the campus at a time when the school was trying to keep outsiders, who could potentially be infected with COVID-19, away.
The long-threatened suit stems from a March 29 viral story that suggested several students were infected after returning from spring break. In fact, no student, staffer, or faculty member on campus was, or became, infected.
JUST POSTED: “We need help to go home.” I visited Liberty U. as the consequences of Jerry Falwell’s decision to reopen the campus amid a pandemic came home to roost. https://t.co/sglQgqzqo8
— Elizabeth Williamson (@NYTLiz) March 29, 2020
The story was never retracted despite pleas from Liberty. “None of this was true. There was never an on-campus student diagnosed with COVID-19. The only actual ‘viral’ element of this narrative that existed was the intense ‘viral’ internet attention it generated for the New York Times’ website and for those paying to advertise on that website,” said the suit, provided in advance to Secrets.
“Attacked for keeping Liberty University open, he now seems to have made a good call.” https://t.co/muEBJ9KhC8
— Jerry Falwell (@JerryFalwellJr) May 18, 2020
In a statement Wednesday evening, Eileen Murphy, the Times’s senior vice president of corporate communications, shrugged off the suit. She told Secrets, “We are confident that our story accurately portrayed the reopening of Liberty University and the public health concerns that the reopening raised. We look forward to defending our work in court. “
The suit said that Liberty, which was started by the late Jerry Falwell and is now run by his son Jerry Falwell Jr., has been a frequent target of the media, especially the New York Times, because it is “clickbait” for liberal readers.
But, Falwell told Secrets today, “they picked on the wrong conservative.”
It is the second embarrassment for the New York Times in two days. On Tuesday, prominent opinion writer Bari Weiss quit and ripped the paper in a public letter saying that the paper’s coverage is driven by “clicks” and Twitter.
“It’s just not right for the mainstream media to lie about and target conservative Christian organizations just because of their faith and because of their political beliefs, and we’re going to make an example out of them,” said Falwell.
Another illustration of why the lying @nytimes and other mainstream #FakeNews publications are failing financially and have lost the public’s trust. ZERO COVID cases on campus @LibertyU and the campus just closed for the semester @NYTLiz ! https://t.co/bY8oXqKsl4
— Jerry Falwell (@JerryFalwellJr) May 7, 2020
Falwell’s action is the second against the New York Times for its story on the university. In April, he pushed for warrants against the reporter and photographer for trespassing. That case was dropped, though the photographer wrote in the New York Times, “I do, however, need Jerry Falwell Jr.’s permission to ever return to Liberty University.”
The suit spelled out several errors and problems with the original story that carried two different headlines, “Liberty Brings Back Its Students, and Coronavirus, Too” and “A University Reopened, and Students Got Sick.” The subhead said, “The decision by the school’s president, Jerry Falwell Jr., to partly reopen his evangelical university enraged residents of Lynchburg, Va. Then students started getting sick.”
For example, it said that the school reopened after spring break. What it did was let back some 1,500 of 15,000 students who were foreign or didn’t want to return home. Virus protections were put in place, including social distancing. Several other colleges and universities did the same thing.
The story also quoted an off-campus physician, Dr. Thomas Eppes, who said several students suffered some flu-like illness, but it turned out not to be the coronavirus. He said his words were twisted and Liberty’s offer to interview the school doctor were ignored.
The state health department also conducted two surprise inspections and found everything in order and in compliance with Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s rules. “All operations appeared to be in compliance with the governor’s emergency order,” said Jim Bowles, a state health manager, before critical stories in the New York Times and ProPublica appeared.
Still, the New York Times wrote, “So Mr. Falwell — a staunch ally of President Trump and an influential voice in the evangelical world — reopened the university last week, igniting a firestorm. As of Friday, Dr. Eppes said, nearly a dozen Liberty students were sick with symptoms that suggested Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus. Three were referred to local hospital centers for testing. An additional eight were told to self-isolate.”
I agree with what Purdue University President Mitch Daniels said about the wisdom of keeping college campuses open where COVID-19 poses close to zero lethal threat to the young people who make up such a high percentage of the campus population. https://t.co/HJt3In8Zgs
— Jerry Falwell (@JerryFalwellJr) June 2, 2020
As it takes efforts to put special protections in place for the upcoming semester, Liberty is eager to exact some revenge on the New York Times. Falwell said the college will donate any money won in a suit decision to groups tackling the coronavirus.
In a statement, he said, “They target us because the university is a conservative and Christian institution. While this fulfilled their ‘clickbait’ business model, it also violated the law in many ways. Therefore, we are holding the New York Times accountable for their malicious and false reporting and their violation of the measures we took to protect our students. Politically-motivated attacks by the mainstream news media that defame and libel conservatives and Christians should not be allowed in the United States of America and will not be tolerated by Liberty University.”
