Opinion ID: 783768
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Standard for Granting Stay

Text: 2 The FTC's request for a stay is governed by Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure 8 and 18. To obtain a stay under these rules, the FTC must address the following factors: (1) the likelihood of success on appeal; (2) the threat of irreparable harm if the stay or injunction is not granted; (3) the absence of harm to opposing parties if the stay or injunction is granted; and (4) any risk of harm to the public interest. Homans v. City of Albuquerque, 264 F.3d 1240, 1243 (10th Cir.2001); 10th Cir. R. 8.1. 3 As an initial matter, the district court suggested that an additional inquiry overlays this Court's analysis of whether to grant a stay of the district court's order pending appeal. Specifically, it cited decisions from this Court setting out the following types of preliminary injunctions as disfavored: (1) one that disturbs the status quo; (2) one that affords the movant substantially all the relief the movant may recover at the conclusion of a full trial on the merits; and (3) one that is mandatory as opposed to prohibitory. Prairie Band of Potawatomi Indians v. Pierce, 253 F.3d 1234, 1247 n. 4 (10th Cir.2001); SCFC ILC, Inc. v. Visa USA, Inc., 936 F.2d 1096, 1098-99 (10th Cir.1991). The concerns arising from the first two types of disfavored injunctions are relevant only in a merits review of a preliminary injunction issued by a district court, typically on an incomplete record. Those concerns do not, however, constrain our decision whether to stay a lower court's permanent injunction issued after consideration of a complete record. 2 The concern about mandatory injunctions is not a factor in this case because a decision to stay the district court's permanent injunction does not constitute a judicial mandate requiring any of the litigants to take any action. Such a stay order would suspend an injunction, not impose one. Therefore, we do not apply the heightened scrutiny required for disfavored preliminary injunctions. 4 With respect to the four stay factors, 3 where the moving party has established that the three harm factors tip decidedly in its favor, the probability of success requirement is somewhat relaxed. Prairie Band, 253 F.3d at 1246; Continental Oil Co. v. Frontier Ref. Co., 338 F.2d 780, 781-82 (10th Cir.1964). Under those circumstances, probability of success is demonstrated when the petitioner seeking the stay has raised questions going to the merits so serious, substantial, difficult, and doubtful as to make the issue ripe for litigation and deserving of more deliberate investigation. Prairie Band, 253 F.3d at 1246-47 (internal quotations omitted). 5 We conclude that, on balance, the three harm factors alone do not support a relaxed review of the probability of success factor. With respect to the second and fourth factors — which are necessarily conflated because the FTC's asserted injury is exclusively one involving the public interest — we conclude that the public does have strong privacy and expectation interests that weigh in favor of granting this stay pending review of the merits. Yet the third factor — injury to opposing parties if the stay is granted — weighs against granting the stay because Respondents will likely suffer harm if the FTC's do-not-call regulation comes into effect and is later determined to be unconstitutional, even though their injury would be tempered by our granting expedited review of this case on the merits. 4 Although we conclude that on balance the harm factors tip in the FTC's favor, those factors do not weigh so heavily towards the FTC as to justify a relaxed review of the final factor, likelihood of success on the merits. Therefore, we will grant a stay only if the FTC shows a substantial likelihood of success on the merits of its appeal. We turn then to that analysis.