Exclusive: Despite bankruptcy dismissal, defamation case against The Gateway Pundit moves ahead

By Paul Wagman

The dismissal of its bankruptcy case in Florida is not stopping the Gateway Pundit from seeking a continued delay in the defamation case against it by two Georgia poll workers. But the case may be moving ahead soon regardless.

In a motion filed Aug.  5 in the St. Louis Circuit Court, lawyers for the Gateway Pundit and for its owner, James Hoft, and his twin brother, Joe Hoft, said the stay in the defamation case that was issued when they filed for bankruptcy last April should remain in place because they plan to appeal the dismissal of the bankruptcy petition. 

Restarting the defamation case in St. Louis before the resolution of the appeal, the lawyers argued in their Aug. 5 motion, could result in the case “proceeding through fits and starts, with the bankruptcy stay being in effect, then likely in effect again … prudence and judicial economy would favor a stay by this Court.” 

The Hofts’ lawyers filed their formal notice in the Florida bankruptcy court of their intention to appeal three days later, on Aug. 8.

But on Aug. 7, Peter J. Dunne, the court-appointed special master in the St. Louis case, filed a “Report and Recommendation” that set a new deadline for completion of discovery in the case  in light of the dismissal of the bankruptcy and the fact that no appeal had been filed at that time.  The new deadline is Nov. 10, two months later than the one that had been in place before the bankruptcy filing in late April derailed the schedule.  Dunne also noted that the case remains on the docket for jury trial in the week of March 10, 2025.  

Now it appears it will be up to the St. Louis Circuit Court whether to accept Dunne’s proposed recommendation. That could be encouraging for the plaintiffs, because the court has to this point shown considerable deference to Dunne’s recommendations.   

The two Georgia poll workers, Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, have contended that the bankruptcy filing itself was a stall tactic in a case where delay has been the strategy from the beginning.  The two women, who are mother and daughter, sued Hoft, his brother Joe and TGP Communications, LLC, which does business as Gateway Pundit, in December 2021 in St. Louis Circuit Court.  They said his false accusations against them of having committed ballot fraud for Joe Biden had led to death threats and other harassment. 

In December 2021, the two women also filed a defamation suit against former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who made the same accusations against them that Hoft made.  But in that case, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, it took only two years for a jury verdict to be rendered. A jury last December awarded the two women compensatory and punitive damages of more than $148 million.   

In St. Louis, however, the defendants have so far been able to avoid any resolution by seeking a change in venue, resisting discovery orders, counter-suing the attorneys for the plaintiffs, and other means.  The same strategy has also worked thus far in dragging out a defamation case filed in Denver against Hoft and the Trump Campaign by Eric Coomer, a former executive of Dominion Voting Systems.  That case was filed a year before the one in St. Louis.

In dismissing the TGP Communications (Gateway Pundit) bankruptcy case, U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Mindy A. Mora wrote that TGP Communications “remains both balance sheet and cash flow solvent.  There is no present financial distress, no looming foreclosure sale, no prospect of a market crash.  There is only the State Court Litigation in which TGP must defend itself. That’s not a basis for bankruptcy relief; it’s the justice system in operation. … TGP filed bankruptcy purely as a litigation strategy … The Court will dismiss this bankruptcy case as a bad faith filing.”

Paul Wagman is a former Post-Dispatch reporter and FleishmanHillard executive who is now an independent reporter, editor and communications consultant.