Court Affirms Free Speech Victory for Dinsmore Client in Campaign Lawsuit

In a case centered around campaign speech, Dinsmore litigators Sarah Reddick and Kenyon Meyer successfully defended their client in a political lawsuit filed during the 2024 primary election in Kentucky.

The candidate received an endorsement from a Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) chapter in March 2024. She promoted this endorsement in her campaign materials, truthfully stating she was the only candidate with FOP support. Her political opponent later obtained a competing FOP endorsement and then sent a cease and desist letter demanding that the candidate remove or change her campaign signs and materials.

The Dinsmore team pushed back, refusing to make the change and citing their client’s free speech rights in a political campaign.  The opponent filed a lawsuit asking the Court to order the candidate to change her campaign signs.  Sarah and Kenyon argued the opponent sought an unconstitutional prior restraint against campaign speech, which enjoys the highest protections our Constitution offers.

Dinsmore filed a response opposing the motion for a restraining order and a motion to dismiss the case under Kentucky’s Uniform Public Expression Protection Act (UPEPA)—a law that protects people from being sued for exercising their free speech rights.

After a hearing where four witnesses testified, the judge agreed with the candidate that the First Amendment protected her campaign signs and prohibited a court from ordering her to change them.  The judge then encouraged the candidate’s opponent dismiss the case with prejudice to avoid being ordered to pay the candidate’s legal fees under UPEPA. The opponent agreed and dropped the case, but Dinsmore’s team objected to the dismissal because it didn’t acknowledge their client’s right to recover attorneys’ fees.

Sarah and Kenyon filed an appeal, focusing solely on that issue. The Kentucky Court of Appeals agreed with them in a published opinion, ruling that the candidate was indeed entitled to have her legal fees covered. The case was sent back to determine the amount of those fees.

The matter involving Dinsmore’s client is only the second published opinion from the Court of Appeals of Kentucky interpreting Kentucky’s Uniform Public Expression Protection Act.