Court Opinion

ID: 9797410
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 04:19:41.093669+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:54:56.670806
License: Public Domain

BRYNER, Chief Justice,
with whom CARPENETI, Justice, joins, dissenting in part.
For the reasons set out in my dissenting opinion in Evans ex rel. Kutch v. State,1 I disagree with the parts of today's opinion that uphold the constitutionality of Alaska's non-economic damages cap and punitive-damages forfeiture provisions. In all other respects I agree with and join in the opinion.
FABE, Justice,
dissenting.
I. Introduction
I eannot agree with the court's conclusion that Leykis's statements, uttered during a national broadcast and discussing a public figure and a public issue, are unprotected speech. Because I disagree with the court's conclusion that the statements Leykis made during his broadcast are not protected speech, I conclude that the trial court's instructions did not prevent the jury from fully considering Carpenter's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim.
In my view, the record does not support the court's conclusion-based largely on seven words-that Leykis issued a "call to arms" inviting listeners to harass Carpenter. Even a cursory examination of the statements within the context of the broadcast reveals that the "call to arms" was nothing more than the sort of hyperbole and rhetoric that is typical of debate about public figures and matters of public concern in this day and age.
Moreover, the trial court recognized the controlling precedent for such statements-the United States Supreme Court's holding in Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell that public figures may not recover for IIED without proving false statements of fact made with actual malice 1-and properly instructed the jury that Carpenter could not recover from Leykis unless the statements were unprotected for another reason.2 Yet, without upsetting the trial court's finding that Carpenter was a public figure,3 the court today concludes that Leykis may be subject to liability for intentional infliction of emotional distress for statements directed at Carpenter during a heated discussion of an issue at the heart of First Amendment protections. Where, as here, an TIED claim is based on speech directed at a public figure and on a matter of public concern, declining to limit IIED liability threatens to erode the breathing space that robust political dialogue requires.
II. Leykis Did Not Issue a "Call to Arms."
I disagree with the factual conclusions upon which the court's opinion rests. I do *76not agree that the record supports the conclusion that Leykis issued a "call to arms" intended to provoke listeners to harass Carpenter or the conclusion that Leykis's words were devoid of any attempt to persuade.4 Examination of Leykis's statements within the overall context of the broadcast reveals that the statements at issue focused directly on the issue of public concern-namely, the show's cancellation. To the extent that his statements encouraged listeners to do anything, it was to persuade Carpenter, a public figure, to change her mind by demonstrating that she held the minority view and by suggesting alternate routes to address her concerns.
The court does not sufficiently identify and analyze the basis for its conclusion that Leykis issued a "call to arms." Unable to point to any statements made by Leykis that overtly encouraged listeners to harass Carpenter, the court patches together two exchanges separated by over an hour in the broadcast. The alleged "call to arms" apparently began when a male caller reported Carpenter's phone number, which was partially blocked out, and her fax number. The caller stated simply that "I think everybody should give her a little piece of ... our minds." Leykis responded to the caller not with an exhortation that listeners use the number to harass Carpenter, but with a statement about censorship:
Well, you know, again here's one person trying to decide for an entire city what you ought to be able to listen to. And, you know, again, you have an off button; you have a station changer button, a tuner. You can get away from the show if you don't want to hear it. But, no, it's not that she doesn't want to hear it. She doesn't want you to hear it.
After further exchange and another statement by Leykis that "it's a shame when the minority can decide what the majority are going to hear," the caller repeated his hope that people would call Carpenter and send her faxes. Leykis responded not by agreeing or suggesting that listeners should harass Carpenter, but by suggesting that the listener "might also contact that fine church in your community that got together to try to do us in." In so doing, Leykis redirected the listener's focus to other proponents of the show's cancellation.5
Leykis's response to the caller's publication of Carpenter's numbers did not include any suggestion that listeners harass Carpenter or make her life a living hell. Indeed, Leykis himself did not directly urge listeners to contact Carpenter for any reason whatsoever. He made no statement to Carpenter that she should expect such treatment. Instead, his speech was directed at the issue of public concern-the cancellation of his show due to what he perceived to be a minority's wishes. Even if Leykis's exchange with the listener could be reasonably construed as actively endorsing some sort of contact with Carpenter, his statements about censorship and contacting other censors suggest he intended to foster political debate rather than encourage personal harassment. Such an exchange is no less protected than a radio show's broadcast of a politician's publicly listed fax number, with an exhortation that listeners contact the politician to express their views on an issue of public concern.
In recognition that the broadcast of Carpenter's fax number alone is not sufficient, the court also relies on a statement by Leyk-is that appears to have occurred over an hour after the caller reported Carpenter's fax number. In this second statement, Leykis said to a female caller from Juneau: "Well, we hate to lose you, but like I say, stay tuned, 'cause we're going to get back on in Juneau." He later continued: "And we're going to make that woman's life a living *77hell." 6 If Leykis intended this statement to encourage listeners to send harassing faxes to Carpenter, common sense suggests that he would have repeated the fax number instead of assuming that listeners had written down the contact information over an hour earlier. But Leykis did not repeat Carpenter's fax number. He did not propose that listeners make Carpenter's life hell by contacting her, nor did he make statements encouraging them to harass Carpenter. Read fairly and in context, the statement merely reflects Leykis's intent to get back on the air in Juneau and his opinion and commentary that, in so doing, he would make Carpenter's life miserable.
The notion that Leykis exhorted viewers to harass Carpenter is further undermined by the reaction of listeners. Contrary to the onslaught of harassing faxes that one might expect if Leykis incited his national audience to make Carpenter's life a living hell, Carpenter testified that she received one phone message 7 and several faxes. Carpenter testified that the faxes "were dealing with the show being taken off the air." Indeed, the faxes submitted as exhibits focused on the discontinuation of the show's broadcast.8 While listeners' actions in response to the broadcast do not conclusively prove the reasonable interpretation of Leykis's comments, the faxes support a conclusion that Leykis did not encourage listeners to harass Carpenter and that listeners did not interpret his statements that way. Moreover, even if he did encourage listeners to contact Carpenter about the issue of public concern-the show's cancellation-his actions fall far short of a "call to arms" exhorting listeners to violate the law to harass Carpenter. In sum, this patchwork of statements cited by the court as supporting a "call to arms" represents nothing more than rhetoric addressing a public figure and an issue of public concern.
The record demonstrates the fallibility of the court's presumption that we can meaningfully distinguish between statements intended to contribute to debate and those intended to harass. It is precisely because of the danger of courts attempting to draw such fine lines that this court and the United States Supreme Court have extended protection to speech directed at public figures and matters of public concern.
III. The First Amendment Protects Leyk-is's Statements.
The court's opinion today is wholly inconsistent with the United States Supreme Court's holding in Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell that public figures may not recover on claims of IIED without a showing of false statements of fact made with actual malice.9
As the court construes it, Carpenter's IIED claim is not based on any statement of fact, false or otherwise. Instead, while conceding that Leykis did not make statements that constitute incitement,10 the court concludes that his statements "provoking his listeners and inviting them ... to harass Carpenter" can be the basis for liability.11 This conclusion violates both the holding and the rationale of Falwell.
In Falwell, the Supreme Court noted that "in the world of debate about public affairs, many things done with motives that are less than admirable are protected by the First *78Amendment."12 The Court reasoned that "while ... a bad motive may be deemed controlling for purposes of tort liability in other areas of the law, we think the First Amendment prohibits such a result in the area of public debate about public figures." 13 As a result, the Supreme Court held that public figures cannot recover for IED without showing a false statement of fact made with malice.14
As the Supreme Court noted in Falwell, "(alt the heart of the First Amendment is the recognition of the fundamental importance of the free flow of ideas and opinions on matters of public interest and concern." 15 The Supreme Court went on to explain the importance of protecting speech critical of public figures:
We have therefore been particularly vigilant to ensure that individual expressions of ideas remain free from governmentally imposed sanctions. The First Amendment recognizes no such thing as a "false" idea....
The sort of robust political debate encouraged by the First Amendment is bound to produce speech that is critical of those who hold public office or those public figures who are intimately involved in the resolution of important public questions or, by reason of their fame, shape events in areas of concern to society at large.... Such criticism, inevitably, will not always be reasoned or moderate; public figures as well as public officials will be subject to vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks.[16]
As explained above, Carpenter, a public figure, bases her IIED claim on rhetoric spoken by Leykis during his discussions of Carpenter's efforts to have his show can-celled. Falwell makes clear that such opinion statements cannot be the basis for an TIED claim.
To find error in the trial court's instruction, the court attempts to limit Falwell today on two different grounds. First, without citing any authority from any court, the court appears to limit Falwell by reading its constitutional protections as inapplicable to statements that are neither true nor false.17 However, this reading cannot be correct. Falwell is clearly intended to protect opinion statements about public figures and matters of public concern. And the very definition of an opinion statement is that its accuracy cannot be established. By attempting to distinguish this case on the grounds that Leyk-is's statement can be neither true nor false, the court exposes all opinion statements directed at public figures to IIED liability. This is not only clearly contrary to Falwell but substantially eviscerates the protections it extended.
The court also tries to limit Falwell by declaring that its protection applies only to speech about public figures.18 But the First Amendment's robust protections for debate in the public realm simply cannot turn on such an amorphous distinction. Moreover, I cannot conclude that the statements at issue-made during a national broadcast-were not about Carpenter. Indeed, Leykis's statement that his return to the air would make Carpenter's life a living hell is undeniably about Carpenter and her reaction to his show. The concern that animated the Court's holding in Falwell-the need to protect heated rhetoric directed at public figures and issues of public concern-applies regardless of how a plaintiff chooses to package her claim and regardless of whether a statement is about a public figure or to a public figure.19 *79Here, Leykis's words, on a matter of public concern and regarding a public figure, reflect his opinions and his attempts to persuade his audience of an injustice. Certainly Leykis's remarks about Carpenter were crass, mean, and utterly repugnant. And they could be construed as endorsing listener contact with Carpenter to express outrage that her actions had caused his show to be cancelled in Juneau. But such incitement to action, petition, or protest on matters of public concern and directed at public figures lies at the core of the sort of speech protected by Falwell.20
Statements of opinion on matters of public concern are often characterized by hyperbole or "very crude offensive method[s] of stating a political opposition." 21 And there is no doubt that Leykis's remarks about Carpenter had an ugly, sexist tone. Nonetheless, because political debate is the core of First Amendment protection, the United States Supreme Court has evinced a strong commitment to ensuring that political hyperbole and emotionally charged rhetoric can be expressed without fear of liability or sanction. Time and again, the Supreme Court has protected such speech. For example, in Watts v. United States, the United States Supreme Court overturned Watts's conviction under a statute prohibiting threats to the President of the United States.22 During a public rally, Watts had stated that he did not intend to report for the draft and that "LI)f they ever make me carry a rifle the first man I want to get in my sights is LB.J."23 The Court upheld the statute, but overturned Watts's conviction, cautioning that the "kind of political hyperbole indulged in" by Watts was not a threat.24 Noting that the political arena "is often vituperative, abusive, and inexact," the Court reasoned that Watts's only offense was "a kind of very crude offensive method of stating a political opposition." 25
Similarly, in NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co., the United States Supreme Court overturned a judgment holding the Field Secretary of the NAACP liable for the economic consequences of a boyeott of white businesses.26 The state court partially based its finding of liability on a speech which included a statement that "Jf we catch any of you going in any of them racist stores, we're gonna break your damn neck." 27 The Supreme Court acknowledged that "[In the passionate atmosphere in which the speeches were delivered, they might have been understood as inviting an unlawful form of discipline or, at least, as intending to create a fear of violence." 28 Nonetheless, the Court held that the speech was protected, reasoning that "(alu advocate must be free to stimulate his audience with spontaneous and emotional appeals for unity and action in a common cause. When such appeals do not incite lawless action, they must be regarded as protected speech." 29
Despite this command that speech on matters of public concern be given great latitude, the court decides this case without citing any explicit statement by Leykis encouraging listeners to illegally harass Carpenter. Instead, the court reads between the lines of several statements of opinion addressing a public figure and a matter of public concern. In so doing, the court violates the principle that claims involving such statements should be read against the "background of a pro*80found national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wideopen, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials." 30
It is this commitment to robust debate that led the United States Supreme Court to create heightened standards for IIED claims by public figures in Falwell Yet the court today sees fit to rely solely on the elements of IIED to protect speech directed at public figures-elements the Supreme Court specifically declared inadequate in Falwell The United States Supreme Court explicitly rejected the notion that the requirement of outrageousness sufficiently protects speech on matters of public concern, reasoning in Falwell:
"Outrageousness" in the area of political and social discourse has an inherent sub-jectiveness about it which would allow a jury to impose liability on the basis of the jurors' tastes or views, or perhaps on the basis of their dislike of a particular expression. An "outrageousness" standard thus runs afoul of our longstanding refusal to allow damages to be awarded because the speech in question may have an adverse emotional impact on the audience.[31]
The subjective nature of outrageousness, particularly when applied to rhetoric, eviscerates the protection for speech on matters of public concern or directed at public figures. Because liability under a subjective test is unpredictable, it threatens to curb the use of such persuasive tools as rhetoric and hyperbole in political speech. It is this premise that the United States Supreme Court recognized in Falwell, and it is this premise that creates the need to establish heightened standards for IIED claims by public figures.
In stark contrast to the heightened standards the Supreme Court deemed necessary in Falwell, the court today concludes that the trial court erred by failing to instruct the jury that a public figure may recover for IIED based on speech that is "intended to harass" 32 or that is intended to "harass by provoking a widespread audience to react with hostility." 33 In so doing, the court creates a new category of unprotected speech directed at public figures-a new category whose precise boundaries it does not define.
Unlike the Supreme Court's conscious efforts to carefully cireumseribe liability and protect public debate in Falwell, Watts, and Claiborne, today's opinion creates a broad and unbounded new category of unprotected speech directed at public figures. The court does not clarify how one can determine when speech is about a public figure, nor does it define "harass" or explain how one can distinguish between opinions that harass and those that do not. Then, despite recognizing "the difficulty of drawing the line accurately," the court expresses confidence in the jury's ability to do so. In my view, such confidence is unwarranted. In the area of the First Amendment, this vagueness is particularly pernicious. In short, the First Amendment demands more.
Today's holding threatens to further chill speech because of the court's conclusion that the jury may consider Leykis's derogatory comments-even those that the opinion concedes are protected speech-in evaluating Carpenter's IIED claim.34 Protected speech can not serve as the basis for lability, regardless of whether that speech serves as the sole basis for Hability or is considered as one factor by the jury. The purpose of protecting speech is to avoid unnecessarily chilling public debate and dialogue. As the United States Supreme Court recognized in New York Times v. Sullivan, speakers fearing potential liability for their statements will "tend to make only statements which 'steer far wider of the unlawful zone.'" 35 Coupled with the fear of Hability for opinion statements, the knowledge that even protected *81speech could be considered by a jury will chill discussion of matters of public concern. Allowing the jury to consider protected speech wholly undermines any protection ostensibly granted that speech.
Moreover, the court advances a startlingly low threshold for testing whether Leykis's speech can be penalized, suggesting in its discussion of jury instructions that "it is enough that a reasonable person could think that his comments were likely to prompt listeners to contact or communicate with Carpenter in a hostile fashion." 36 But encouraging others to contact or communicate with a public figure, even in a hostile fashion, lies at the heart of public debate and the democratic system itself. For example, under this holding, liability could even be imposed on a broadcast that encouraged listeners to call a town mayor and express their views on an issue such as taxation if listeners were encouraged to insult the mayor. Such liability erodes the breathing space for matters of public concern that the United States Supreme Court has vigilantly guarded.
The court turns to analogy to justify its holding. To support its conclusion that Leykis's speech is unprotected, the court analogizes to decisions upholding ordinances banning residential picketing.37 The court cites Frisby v. Schultz38 for the proposition that the home is given special solicitude. In Frisby, the United States Supreme Court upheld a content-neutral ordinance which prohibited only "focused picketing taking place in front of a particular residence." 39 The Court emphasized that protestors were not banned from residential neighborhoods and remained free to go door-to-door, to distribute literature, and to contact residents by phone.40 But upholding a content-neutral ordinance banning a narrow type of picketing is a far ery from penalizing rhetoric because it may have encouraged listeners to contact a public figure about a matter of public concern. As a result, Frisby simply does not support a conclusion that Leykis incited unlawful conduct on the part of his listeners. Even if he encouraged listeners to blanket Carpenter with objections to the show's cancellation, Leykis's speech is protected communication.
Similarly, United States v. Popa,41 relied on by the court today,42 demonstrates the constitutionally important difference between unprotected harassment and rhetoric on a matter of public concern. In Popa, the D.C. Cireuit vacated the conviction of a defendant who had been prosecuted under a statute making it a crime to make telephone calls "without disclosing [one's] identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person." 43 The defendant had made seven phone calls to the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, including two recorded calls in which he referred to the United States Attorney as a "criminal" and a "whore," who "violated our rights." 44 Noting that the defendant testified that he had called to complain about having been assaulted by police officers and the prosecutor's conduct, the court reasoned that the statute was unconstitutional as applied because "[plunishment of those who use the telephone to communicate a political message" did not further the government's interest in "protecting individuals from non-communicative uses of the telephone." 45 Similarly, the First Amendment would likely protect a listener who directly contacted Carpenter to express a view. And, as detailed earlier, Leykis did not encourage listeners to illegally harass Carpenter by phone or by fax. At most, he encouraged them to express their opinions and petition on behalf of the show. As the D.C. Circuit concluded in *82Popa, such political communication with a public figure on a matter of public concern is protected speech.
Moreover, the court's analogy to telephonic harassment overlooks the fundamental distinction between prohibiting harassing calls and punishing speech that encouraged others to make telephone calls. The court does not base its holding on any conduct by Leykis; he did not telephone or fax Carpenter. Instead, the court's holding is based on a conclusion that Leykis's words could be construed to exhort others to telephone or fax Carpenter. Despite the obvious echoes of incitement that permeate this line of reasoning, the court makes no argument that Leyk-is's actions rose to the level of incitement or that there was any error in the jury's instruction on incitement.
Today the court overlooks over forty years of United States Supreme Court precedent dedicated to ensuring adequate breathing space for speech about public figures and matters of public concern. It directly contravenes the United States Supreme Court's command that claims of IIED brought by public figures must meet the heightened standards of proving false facts and actual malice.
IV. The Mount Juneau Privilege for Matters of Public Concern Protects Leykis's Statements.
The court's opinion is also wholly inconsistent with this court's longstanding policy of protecting speech on matters of public interest and concern through application of the actual malice standard. Even if Carpenter were not a public figure, the Mount Juneau privilege protects Leykis's statements and precludes liability in the absence of actual malice and a false statement of fact. As this court recognized in Mount Juneau:
[The public figure test is not the only route to application of the actual malice standard. We further protect the free exchange of ideas by applying the actual malice standard to publications on issues of public interest and concern, even if the defamation plaintiff is not a public figure.... [46]
Citing Pearson v. Fairbanks Publishing Co., we explained the rationale for such a policy as follows:
On the one hand there is the interest in safeguarding the right to one's reputation. On the other hand there is the interest in allowing freedom of debate and expression on public questions and issues. We believe that a fair balance of these competing interests is achieved where the law of defamation permits one, without lability for damages, to comment, criticize and pass judgment on statements made by another on an issue or matter of public interest, even if such comment, criticism and judgment involves misstatements of fact-so long as such misstatements are relevant to the subject matter spoken or written about by the one claiming to be defamed and are not shown by him to have been made with actual malice.[47]
In Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., the United States Supreme Court concluded that although the actual malice standard was appropriately applied to those who "occupy positions of such pervasive power and influence that they are deemed public figures for all purposes" and to limited-purpose public figures who have "thrust themselves to the forefront of particular public controversies in order to influence the resolution of the issues involved," a separate analysis is required with respect to private individuals.48 The Court held that "so long as they do not impose liability without fault, the States may define for themselves the appropriate standard of liability for a publisher or broadcaster of defamatory falsehoods injurious to a private individual." 49
In the wake of Gertz, a majority of states have adopted a negligence standard with re*83spect to defamation claims brought by private individuals, making it easier for private plaintiffs to recover in defamation actions.50 This court declined to follow suit in Mount Juneau, reaffirming its commitment to freedom of speech and expression on matters of public interest by adhering to the actual malice standard, even for private individuals. In Taranto v. North Slope Borough, we recognized a further extension of this privilege to speech on matters of public health and safety.51 These cases reflect our consistent policy of balancing the need to safeguard an individual's reputation with the need for freedom of debate and expression on issues of public concern.52
To the extent that the court's opinion can be read to allow individuals to recover damages under IIED claims for speech that would otherwise be privileged as speech on a matter of public interest and concern, I would depart from its reasoning. Instead, in recognition of the inherent logic of Falwell, and in respect for the balance this court has consistently struck in favor of discussion on public issues, I would extend protection to Leykis's statement under the Mount Juneau privilege. Because I think it is clear that Leykis's comments related to a matter of public interest and concern, the Mount Ju-meau privilege applies, protecting all statements except false statements of fact made with malice.
V. Conclusion
Because I disagree that Leykis encouraged his listeners to harass Carpenter, and because Leykis's speech is protected opinion speech directed at a public figure and a matter of public concern, I respectfully dissent from the court's opinion today.

. 56 P.3d 1046, 1075-76 (Alaska 2002).

. 485 U.S. 46, 56, 108 S.Ct. 876, 99 LEd.2d 41 (1988).

. The court today does not contend that the trial court failed to properly instruct the jury on incitement or true threats.

. The concurrence argues that Carpenter was not a limited purpose public figure, reasoning that her participation in the attempt to remove the Tom Leykis Show from the air was insufficient "'to confer limited-purpose public figure status on her." Concurrence at 71. I believe the trial court correctly decided that Carpenter was a limited purpose public figure because she "voluntarily injected ... herself into the controversy" regarding whether the Tom Leykis Show should remain on the airwaves by "purposely trying to influence the outcome." Mount Juneau Enters., Inc. v. Juneau Empire, 891 P.2d 829, 836 (Alaska 1995) (internal quotations omitted); see also Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 351, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 LEd.2d 789 (1974) (a limited purpose public figure is one who "voluntarily injects himself ... into a particular public controversy"); Waldbaum v. Fairchild Publ'ns, Inc., 627 F.2d 1287, 1292 (D.C.Cir.1980) ("a person has become a public figure for limited purposes if he is attempting to have, or realistically can be expected to have, a major impact on the resolution of a specific public dispute that has foreseeable and substantial ramifications for persons beyond its immediate participants").

. Majority at 58.

. Other statements in the broadcast confirm that Leykis's intent extended no further than to encourage debate and petitions. For example, he stated early in the broadcast that ""I'm going to find out who these people are, and we'll put it up on the web site." When the caller replied: "That would be just wonderful," Leykis continued: "And we're-we're going to find out who buckled to the pressure in terms of these advertisers. We're going to find out, and we're going to let you know who they are. And then you can write your own letters."

. This echoes Leykis's earliee comment that "[ylou can't stop this show. Oh, you can stop Juneau, Alaska. But you can't stop me. And I'm on the Internet baby.... And it doesn't matter; you can take me off the air. It will not maiter. Juneau, Alaska will still get this show .. one way or the other."

. In addition to one phone message, Carpenter testified that she received hang-up calls and spoke with one person who called her a jerk before she hung up.

. One argued that "[nlo one has the right to dictate to me or to anyone else what I have the right to listen to.... That's what they make off buttons for." Another echoed this thought, suggesting that the on-off knob is the appropriate avenue for dealing with media one finds to be distasteful. A third fax stated: "Hey You Know What Thanks to You Tom Leykis Has Been Can-celled." It appears that a second page of this fax also stated: "You are a jerk! P.S. Sit on it!"

. 485 U.S. 46, 108 S.Ct. 876, 99 LEd.2d 41 (1988).

. Majority at 60.

. Majority at 57.

. 485 U.S. at 53, 108 S.Ct. 876.

. Id.

. Id. at 56, 108 S.Ct. 876.

. Id. at 50, 108 S.Ct. 876.

16. Id. at 51, 108 S.Ct. 876 (internal quotations and citations omitted).

. Majority at 56-57.

. Majority at 56-57.

. I do not contest the court's suggestion that, were the statements unprotected for another established reason-such as true threat of incitement to illegal activity-Leykis would be liable even without a showing of false facts stated with actual malice. Majority at 56 n. 44. However, unless the speech is unprotected for another reason-a conclusion the court does not reach-an IIED claim by a public figure cannot succeed without meeting the heightened standards of Falwell.

. Because the court assumes Carpenter is a public figure and the cancellation of the show a matter of public concern, the New York court's decision in Esposito-Hilder v. SFX Broadcasting, Inc., is inapposite. In Esposito-Hilder, that court upheld a ruling that an employee at a radio station had a claim for IIED based on a competing radio station's broadcast of derogatory comments about her wedding photo. 236 A.D.2d 186, 665 N.Y.S.2d 697, 700-01 (1997). Unlike Carpenter, the plaintiff in Esposito-Hilder was a private figure; her wedding photo was not a matter of public concern. Falwell did not apply.

. Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 705, 708, 89 S.Ct. 1399, 22 L.Ed.2d 664 (1969).

. Id.

. Id. at 706.

. Id. at 707-08.

. Id. at 708.

. 458 U.S. 886, 926, 102 S.Ct. 3409, 73 L.Ed.2d 1215 (1982).

. Id. at 902, 102 S.Ct. 3409.

. Id. at 927, 102 S.Ct. 3409.

. Id. at 928, 102 S.Ct. 3409.

. Watts, 394 U.S. at 708, 89 S.Ct. 1399 (internal quotations & citation omitted).

31. Falwell, 485 U.S. at 55, 108 S.Ct. at 882.

. Majority at 59.

. Majority at 62.

. Majority at 61-62.

. 376 U.S. 254, 279, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 LEd.2d 686 (1964) (quoting Speiser v. Randall, 357 U.S. 513, 526, 78 S.Ct. 1332, 2 LEd.2d 1460 (1958)).

. Majority at 62 {(emphasis added).

. Majority at 60.

. 487 U.S. 474, 108 S.Ct. 2495, 101 LEd.2d 420 (1988).

. Id. at 483, 108 S.Ct. 2495.

. Id. at 483-84, 108 S.Ct. 2495.

. 187 F.3d 672 (D.C.Cir.1999).

. Majority at 61.

. 187 F.3d at § 223(a)(1)(C)). 674 (quoting 47 U.S.C.

. Id. at 673.

. Id. at 677 (internal quotations omitted).

46. Mount Juneau Enters., Inc. v. Juneau Empire, 891 P.2d 829, 837 (Alaska 1995).

47. Id. at 837-38 (citing Pearson v. Fairbanks Publishing Co., Inc., 413 P.2d 711, 713 (Alaska 1966)).

. 418 U.S. 323, 344-45, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974).

. Id. at 347, 94 S.Ct. 2997.

. See, eg., 1 Romert D. Sack, Sack on DEFAMATION® LreEt, amp Retarep Prostems § 6.1 (3d ed.2007).

. 992 P.2d 1111, 1115 (Alaska 1999).

. See Gay v. Williams, 486 F.Supp. 12, 16 (D.Alaska 1979) (interpreting Alaska law).