A federal appeals court on Thursday tossed a free speech lawsuit filed by the NRA against a former New York official, ruling the official is immune from the claims filed against her.
A three-judge panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled that Maria Vullo, a former superintendent of New York‘s Department of Financial Services, is entitled to qualified immunity from the charges because there is no “clearly established” law she violated, as the NRA claims.
The NRA alleged that Vullo violated its First Amendment rights by using her regulatory power to pressure state financial institutions to cut ties with the NRA following the 2018 Parkland school shooting.
“We conclude again that Vullo is entitled to qualified immunity, for the law was not clearly established that the conduct alleged here, regulatory action directed at the nonexpressive conduct of third parties, constituted coercion or retaliation violative of the First Amendment,” Judge Denny Chin said in the Thursday ruling.
The appeals court tossed the NRA’s challenge because no established law at the time explicitly illegalized Vullo’s alleged coercion of the financial institutions.
“Reasonable officials in Vullo’s position would not have known for certain … that her conduct crossed the line from forceful but permissible persuasion to impermissible coercion and retaliation,” the appeals court said in its ruling.
The ruling comes just over a year after the Supreme Court unanimously revived the case, reversing the Second Circuit’s previous ruling that the NRA did not properly show it plausibly alleged that Vullo had violated the First Amendment. The high court did not rule on whether Vullo had immunity, something the Second Circuit decided she was entitled to in Thursday’s ruling.
The NRA told the Washington Examiner in a statement that it is considering “all legal action in appealing this ruling,” including petitioning the case back to the Supreme Court.
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“Although we are disappointed in the Second Circuit’s ruling, we are confident in our position and are evaluating all appropriate next steps,” NRA CEO and executive vice president Doug Hamlin said in a statement.
The case is a rare First Amendment legal action from the NRA, which typically brings Second Amendment cases to court. The lengthy legal battle began at the federal district court level in May 2018 and reached the appeals court in 2021.