Steve Wynn asks U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider historic press freedom ruling

Former Las Vegas casino executive Steve Wynn has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a historic 1964 decision that has set the American standard for libel law — and been a bedrock of free press protections — for the past 60 years.

Wynn is seeking the review of New York Times vs. Sullivan in connection with his 2018 defamation lawsuit against The Associated Press and reporter Regina Garcia Cano. In the lawsuit, he said AP published false statements with “actual malice” about accusations that he engaged in sexual misconduct with women.

Media law experts say the consequences would be significant if the high court reversed the 1964 ruling.

The full Nevada Supreme Court in September 2024 ended Wynn’s lawsuit and rejected his bid for a jury trial, saying the claim ran afoul of the state’s anti-SLAPP law.

That unanimous ruling said Nevada’s anti-SLAPP statutes — an acronym for strategic lawsuit against public participation — “were designed to limit precisely the type of claim at issue here, which involves a news organization publishing an article in a good faith effort to inform their readers regarding an issue of clear public interest.”

“The public had an interest in understanding the history of misconduct alleged to have been committed by one of the most recognized figures in Nevada,” the opinion said, “and the article directly relates to that interest.”

Based on police reports

In February 2018, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department held a news conference revealing that two women filed complaints against Wynn — one in Las Vegas, the other in Chicago — decades apart.

AP reporter Cano requested copies of the women’s complaints from police under the Nevada Public Records Act, and her story based on the police reports appeared in newspapers and websites across the country, including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

Wynn, 83, says the claims in those police reports are false. He has denied all sexual misconduct allegations made against him.

“Any decision to scale back or unwind the New York Times v. Sullivan decision would be a massive blow to press freedoms and the media’s ability to report on public figures,” Review-Journal Executive Editor Glenn Cook said of Wynn’s petition.

The 110-page petition for a writ of certiorari was filed Jan. 31 by Wynn’s Las Vegas lawyers, Pisanelli Bice PLLC. In the filing, the former CEO and chairman of the board of Wynn Resorts Ltd. asked the nation’s highest court to overturn Times vs. Sullivan, which set a standard for plaintiffs to prove “actual malice” to prevail in defamation claims.

“Actual malice” means a defendant knew a statement was false or acted with reckless disregard for whether the statement was false at a time when the defendant entertained serious doubts that the statement was true. The court extended the “actual malice” standard to include public figures in a separate case, Curtis Publishing Co. vs. Butts.

Wynn: No longer a public figure

Wynn has said he ceased being a public figure when he left Wynn Resorts in February 2018, after The Wall Street Journal, the Las Vegas Review-Journal and other publications reported allegations that he had sexually harassed and coerced some of his female employees.

Wynn, who built some of the most iconic resorts on the Strip, paid a $10 million fine to Nevada gaming regulators and agreed to no longer have involvement in the industry.

“Compelled by this court’s constitutional decisions in Sullivan and Curtis Publishing Co., states like Nevada have incorporated the actual-malice standard into their anti-SLAPP statutes,” Wynn’s petition says. “As a result, those states require public-figure plaintiffs to prove the merits of their case — including actual malice — before any discovery occurs (or with only ‘limited’ discovery). State courts are split over the application of the actual-malice standard’s clear and convincing evidence burden to public-figure plaintiffs in anti-SLAPP cases and whether it violates a plaintiff’s right to a civil jury trial.”

Cook said Wynn previously has pushed back on the right of the press to accurately report on him from privileged public records. Attorneys representing Wynn in 1998 pressured the Review-Journal against publishing allegations, reported from part of a federal lawsuit, that he coerced a Mirage waitress into sex. The Review-Journal’s management subsequently killed the story. The story was published under the newspaper’s current management in 2018.

“The Review-Journal could have brought forward allegations of sexual misconduct against Wynn 30 years before the events that ended his career in gaming,” Cook said. “That was public information about a powerful public figure. Public figures are held to a different standard for good reason.”

Benjamin Lipman, the Review-Journal’s chief legal officer, said the U.S. Supreme Court was called on at various times during the 20th century to explain the scope of First Amendment protections provided to the press and the public when a plaintiff decides to sue over something written or said.

“One of the critical holdings the court made when the issue came up more than 60 years ago was that discussion about important topics or about people with power or influence could not be robust without requiring such people to show the defendant knew the statement was false or entertained serious doubts about it,” Lipman said. “If the liberties recognized in New York Times v. Sullivan are undermined by overturning it, our public debate will suffer as a result.”

Potential chilling effect

Another media law expert said he doesn’t expect the Supreme Court to consider Wynn’s request.

George Freeman, executive director of the New York-based Media Law Resource Center, said Friday that he believes the court has no appetite to overturn a 60-year-old precedent.

“The court hasn’t gotten more than two votes to review it again,” Freeman said. “I don’t see that this case is all that exciting … especially since there so are so many other controversies boiling around the court, from Roe v. Wade to ethics issues. It would seem to be another huge controversy upsetting a 60-year-old precedent that’s held pretty dear by not only the media but the public.”

But he added that if the case is reviewed and the decision overturned, the results could be dire for the media and the public.

“It would chill reporting on public issues and on public people,” Freeman said. “Frankly, that’s about the last thing our democracy needs right now, is a chill on discussion of what public figures do.”

Since Wynn’s departure from the company, Wynn Resorts has completely restructured its board of directors, removed some of its executives, revamped its process for reviewing employee concerns involving harassment and other issues and has changed CEOs twice.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on X.