From the case Taibbi v. Higgins, a ruling handed down yesterday by Judge George Daniels of the Southern District of New York:
This dispute centers on Owned: How Tech Billionaires Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left (the Book), a work authored by Higgins and released by Bold Type Books. Owned claims to investigate how “tech elites and former left‑wing journalists formed an alliance” to foster a freshly configured right‑leaning media ecosystem.
In the court’s view, the Book portrays the plaintiff as one among several independent journalists whose views shifted in recent years in order to appeal to a more conservative audience. The plaintiff began his reporting career in post‑Soviet Russia. In 2004, he joined Rolling Stone, where he earned recognition for reporting on “the big banks and the excesses of Wall Street” during the 2007–2008 financial crisis. According to the Book, the plaintiff’s standing among liberal commentators declined after he challenged allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, and “old misogynistic writings resurfaced,” the Book contends, resulting in, as the Book puts it, a loss of favor with the left and a pivot toward a new right‑wing audience. In 2020, the plaintiff departed Rolling Stone for Substack, a subscription-based newsletter platform.
In 2022, Elon Musk bought the Twitter platform (now known as X). The Book contends that Musk, aiming “to expose the rot at the core of the entire company,” sought out journalists to review internal company documents. These documents would allegedly “show how Twitter had responded to government censorship requests and handled controversial content.” Eventually, Musk offered the plaintiff the chance to review the Twitter Files, on the condition that he publish his reporting on the platform.
On December 2, 2022, the plaintiff released his initial findings on the Twitter Files. Among other things, the plaintiff reported on Twitter’s decision to suppress a New York Post article about Hunter Biden’s laptop ahead of the 2020 election, and the Trump Administration’s repeated demands that Twitter remove material.
The Book asserts that the plaintiff’s increased exposure from the Twitter Files project caused his Twitter following to surge and his already thriving Substack to gain thousands of new subscribers. The Book also claims that the plaintiff’s reporting generated a financial windfall. The plaintiff contends, however, that during the second and third months of the project he faced 4,844 subscriber cancellations and a revenue loss of $20,644 as readers grew frustrated that he was publishing on another platform. In total, 13.7% of the plaintiff’s Substack subscribers joined after the publication of his Twitter Files reporting.
In 2023, Musk invited the plaintiff to leave Substack and join his new “Twitter Subs” platform, saying the plaintiff would attract “far more subscribers.” According to the Book, the offer followed a blanket ban on Twitter of all Substack links. Higgins, supra at 195. The plaintiff declined, explaining that accepting would make him look like an employee of Twitter and create serious optics and ethical concerns. The plaintiff further alleges that after his refusal Musk immediately removed him from the Twitter Files project and reduced his Twitter reach by freezing and deamplifying his audience.
On February 2, 2025, Higgins sought to interview the plaintiff about the impending publication of the Book. The interview was framed as a chance to discuss how the plaintiff’s audience had evolved and, more broadly, how he perceived the political landscape of left and right. The plaintiff declined with a curt “Lol. Pass.”
Bold Type Books released the Book on February 4, 2025. The plaintiff contends that after publication Higgins admitted that the Book contains no evidence of any direct financial deal between the plaintiff and Musk….
The plaintiff asserted defamation, focusing on the following statements (the allegedly defamatory material is set in bold by the court):
- “Owned.”
- “Bought.”
- “Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi’s decades-long journey from the world of alternative journalism into the snug patronage of billionaires is a story with profound and troubling implications for the future of journalism and unfettered thinking.”
- “In recent years, right‑wing billionaires like Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, and David Sacks have turned to media as their next investment and source of influence. Their cronies are Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi….”
- “Owned follows the money, names names, and offers a chilling portrait of a future social media and news landscape.”
- “It is a biting expose of journalistic greed, tech‑billionaire ambition, and a lament for a disappearing free press.” ..
- “Taibbi’s Twitter Files reporting is a perfect example: he spent decades building up credibility and credentials only to, in one high‑profile moment, cash in to launder a CEO’s cherry‑picked corporate opposition file on his opponents.”
- “His Twitter account blew up, and his Substack—already incredibly successful—gained thousands of subscriptions. The reporting generated a financial windfall for the writer, even if its findings were dismissed by more sober commentators.”
- “His Substack had exploded after the Twitter Files reporting and he’d promised to continue exposing censorship of the social media site.”
- “It was this threat to Taibbi’s bottom line that finally motivated the journalist to act.”
- “After years of confrontational commentary on the financial industry and questioning the mainstream, Taibbi fully dispensed with any pretense of challenging power late in 2022.”
The court determined that, in context, the statements amounted to opinion rather than actionable facts:
Statements 1 and 2, the words “Owned” and “Bought” on the Book’s front cover, can be read either literally or metaphorically depending on the surrounding text. The plaintiff concedes that the Book’s contents cannot support any literal interpretation, noting that the “Book contains no evidence of any financial transaction, payment, contract, or quid pro quo involving Plaintiff.”
In this setting, “Owned” and “Bought” naturally come across as attention‑ grabbing rhetoric used to convey Higgins’s views and the Book’s conclusions. Aside from the scattered phrases discussed below, the plaintiff does not challenge the factual core behind these views or point to language suggesting the opinions rest on facts beyond those disclosed in the book. The plaintiff may dislike Higgins’s subjective conclusions or disagree with their accuracy, but that does not render them defaming.
Statement 3, that the plaintiff was in “the snug patronage of billionaires,” likewise constitutes nonactionable opinion. Like “Owned” and “Bought,” the phrase “snug patronage” lacks a precise, universally understood meaning, leaving readers unable to determine truth or falsity. The remark also appears on the back cover as a reviewer’s comment beneath the heading “Praise for Owned.” From that placement, a reader would likely view it as the reviewer’s opinion, supported by the book’s disclosed facts, rather than a factual allegation about the plaintiff.
Statement 4—located on the book’s left flap—claims the plaintiff was among the right‑wing technocratic billionaires’ “cronies.” Courts in this district have previously held that describing someone as a “crony,” without further substantiation, is nonactionable rhetorical hyperbole. The same reasoning applies here. The assertion that the plaintiff is a billionaire’s crony is the type of excessive, unverifiable language that signals to a reasonable reader that the statement reflects the author’s opinion rather than a factual assertion.
Statement 5 also appears on the left flap and asserts that the Book “follows the money, names names,” and is a “biting expose of journalistic greed.” The plaintiff argues that “follows the money” and “names names” imply to readers that the author has traced real financial ties and identified specific recipients of improper payments or patronage. “In New York, a libel claim cannot be sustained if the allegedly defamatory statement is not ‘of and concerning’ the plaintiff but speaks about a group of which the plaintiff is a member.” Statement 5 does not indicate that it is “of and concerning” the plaintiff alone—it describes Higgins’s investigative method for all the Book’s subjects, not just the plaintiff. A reasonable reader would therefore not interpret “follows the money” and “names names” as false factual statements about the plaintiff.
Statement 6 designates the Book as an “exposé of journalistic greed,” which the plaintiff says asserts professional dishonesty and unethical conduct. Yet, whether someone is driven by greed or ambition is a subjective assessment that cannot be definitively proven true or false. Moreover, the left‑flap placement of this statement suggests that the supporting facts are contained within the Book itself.
The plaintiff acknowledges that these statements might be protected as opinion when viewed in isolation. He contends, however, that when considered together, the statements on the Book’s cover and jacket give rise to an implied factual assertion that the plaintiff was paid. He is correct that nonactionable statements can, when combined, create false implications that form the basis for a defamation claim. But plaintiffs bringing defamation by implication claims must “make a rigorous showing that the language of the communication as a whole can be reasonably read both to impart a defamatory inference and to affirmatively suggest that the author intended or endorsed that inference.”
Even assuming the plaintiff has properly asserted a claim for defamation by implication, despite not labeling his sole cause of action accordingly, he has failed to plead facts showing that the defendants intended or endorsed the defamatory inference. As noted, the plaintiff concedes that “the Book contains no evidence whatsoever that Plaintiff received payments, sponsorship, or financial inducement from Elon Musk or any other billionaire.”
Rather than endorsing the asserted defamatory implication, the Book argues that the plaintiff’s central reason for agreeing to participate in the Twitter Files was to “gain access.” The plaintiff also maintains that Higgins “contemporaneously admitted that readers expecting evidence of who was ‘bought’ would be disappointed.” In short, the Book’s content and Higgins’s contemporaneous statements distance the Book from the alleged defamatory implication. Absent additional facts pointing to the defendants’ intent, the plaintiff’s defamation‑by‑implication claim fails….
Several of the alleged defamatory statements within the Book are also nonactionable. First, in statement 7, the phrases “cash in” and “launder” are preceded by a reference to the plaintiff’s “decades” spent “building up credibility and credentials.” This context makes clear that the Book’s use of “cash in” does not refer to literal money, but rather to the notion that the plaintiff traded his reputation for access to the Twitter Files. Such figurative language would lead a reasonable reader to treat this as an opinion rather than a factual assertion.
Likewise, statement 8 is a nonactionable subjective assessment, claiming that the plaintiff’s Substack “gained thousands of subscriptions” after the Twitter Files, translating to a “financial windfall.” Yet, as the plaintiff’s counsel acknowledged at argument, this statement, viewed in the abstract, does not defame because it does not itself harm the plaintiff’s reputation. Even if one could construe a defamatory meaning, the plaintiff admits that he did indeed gain thousands of Substack subscribers after the Twitter Files reporting. Whether that increase constitutes a “windfall” is a matter of subjective interpretation.
Statements 9, 10, and 11 likewise amount to nonactionable opinions. Statement 9 asserts that the plaintiff’s Substack “exploded” after the Twitter Files. Like “financial windfall,” whether something “exploded” in value is a subjective judgment. Finally, statements 10 and 11—that the plaintiff was driven by a risk to his bottom line and that he “fully dispensed with any pretense of challenging power” late in 2022—are neither provable true or false. The questions of motive for leaving Twitter and whether the plaintiff adequately challenged power are matters of opinion….
Liz McNamara and Leena Charlton (Davis Wright Tremaine LLP) represent the defendants.
