OMAHA, Neb.– The Nebraska Supreme Court ruled Friday that a jury must decide whether former Republican legislative candidate Janet Palmtag was defamed by her own political party in a 2020 race that highlighted a growing schism within the state GOP.
The Supreme Court’s decision reversed a lower court ruling in which a judge sided with the Republican Party of Nebraska in dismissing the lawsuit before a jury could hear it.
The lawsuit centers on campaign mailers sent by the party in October 2020 that falsely claimed that Palmtag — a lifelong Republican from Nebraska — had been accused of mishandling business trust accounts and had lost her real estate license. The mailers, which were sent to approximately 3,200 households with registered voters, included statements that Palmtag had “violated the law and lost its real estate license,” and that its license “had been revoked.” The mailers also described Palmtag as “too irresponsible to detain her.” license.”
The mailers grossly mischaracterized a 2018 Iowa disciplinary case in which Palmtag’s real estate brokerage was found responsible for improperly transferring funds from an Iowa account to a Nebraska account. It was not Palmtag, but another broker working for the company that executed the improper transaction. The company paid a $500 fine for the surveillance.
Two years later, Palmtag canceled its real estate license in Iowa, citing a lack of sales for its business there. The decision did not relate to the disciplinary case, she said.
Palmtag demanded corrections to the mailers, but the state party refused. After her loss in the November 2020 election, she sued the state GOP for defamation.
In 2022, a judge dismissed the lawsuit, saying that while the state party’s mailers were defamatory, Palmtag would not be able to prove to a jury that the party acted with actual malice.
The state Supreme Court disagreed, noting that Palmtag had demonstrated that the Republican Party had failed to investigate whether Palmtag was the subject of the Iowa real estate disciplinary case or whether it had been the catalyst for the inactivating her real estate license in Iowa. Palmtag also presented as evidence text messages between then-GOP executive director Ryan Hamilton and a GOP salesman, who responded when told about the party’s accusations against Palmtag: “Okay, that’s not real.”
“A jury could conclude that the party chose not to investigate further in a deliberate circumvention of the truth,” Judge John Freudenberg wrote for the court.
Palmtag would like to have a jury hear the case, its attorney David Domina of Omaha said Friday.
The mailers and other party campaign efforts were aimed at helping Sen. Julie Slama of Peru, Palmtag’s rival in the officially nonpartisan race.
Slama was appointed to the seat by the then government in 2019. Pete Ricketts to fill a vacancy. When she ran for the seat in 2020, Ricketts endorsed her, but his predecessor, fellow Republican Dave Heineman, endorsed Palmtag. That exposed a division in the party, with some lining up to support Palmtag and Heineman — the longest-serving governor in Nebraska — while others backed Slama and Ricketts, who now represent Nebraska in the U.S. Senate.
Some Republicans expressed outrage at the mailers, while Ricketts and others supported the campaign attacks. But the party’s actions in the legislative race marked a new level in the intraparty struggle. Within days of sending out the mailers, the state GOP and a political consulting firm it hired were found liable for making illegal robocalls to help Slama in the race.
The Nebraska Public Service Commission determined that the automated calls were made without proper disclosure and that neither the GOP nor the consulting firm had registered with the commission or submitted a script of the call to the commission as required by law.
Kamron Hasan, an Omaha attorney representing the Nebraska GOP, said the party is disappointed by Friday’s ruling.
“We are still looking at the next steps at this time,” he said.