Conservative Idaho blogger who defamed drag performer appeals verdict, seemingly using AI for legal backing
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Alexandra Duggan, The Spokesman-Review
COEUR D’ALENE (The Spokesman-Review) — A conservative Idaho blogger who defamed a drag performer by implying he exposed himself during Coeur d’Alene’s Pride in the Park four years ago wants her jury verdict thrown out.
“The damages were inflated,” Summer Bushnell told the Idaho Supreme Court justices in a Lewiston courtroom Thursday, calling the jury’s findings “faulty.”
Bushnell, who owns the far-right blog “The Bushnell Report,” accused drag performer Eric Posey in 2022 of exposing his genitals to children by publishing a video of Posey performing with his crotch area blurred out, implying he was flashing the crowd.
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The post went viral in conservative circles.
Her claims spurred a police investigation that found Posey never exposed himself, that he was clothed during the performance and the video was edited.
A North Idaho jury in 2024 ordered Bushnell to pay over $1.1 million in damages to Posey, who said he was going through a “dark time” after being plastered across the internet, causing him to lose his job and experience severe emotional distress, The Spokesman-Review reported.
Bushnell, representing herself on Thursday, said she disagreed with how certain questions were framed to the jury at the time and that they didn’t have enough information to make a fair decision.
She also said there was no “causal connection” between her conduct and the damages, and she “did not have any malice” toward Posey at the time of the post.
But Idaho Supreme Court judges appeared skeptical of Bushnell’s arguments Thursday.
“The allegations in this case of modifying a video and lying about its contents and publicizing it sound pretty serious,” Idaho Supreme Court Justice Gregory Moeller said. “Help me understand why it’s not as serious as the jury thought it was.”
“Because I don’t feel like they have the right instructions,” Bushnell responded. “…I felt like the judge kind of went out of bounds … I came into a jury that already was assuming guilt to my case … I do not agree that I admitted to anything on the stand.”
Moeller called her responses “word salad.”
Posey’s attorney Wendy Olson said there is no Idaho statute that provides a jury on what the limitations for punitive damages are.
“We think that the evidence was clear here to prove the defamation claims (and) that the punitive damages award should go to the jury and the jury return such a verdict,” Olson said. “We see no error in the jury instructions … And as my conversation with Justice Moeller indicates, they were actually more favorable to Ms. Bushnell.”
Bushnell also appeared to cite misrepresented or nonexistent case law in her arguments to the court, the judges pointed out, implying she likely used AI to write her appellate brief.
“I am a good writer,” Bushnell responded. “I am not a legal expert.”
At the end, Moeller reminded Bushnell of the purpose of a trial.
“Trials are quests for truth. This is a case that’s about allegedly telling lies about someone to hurt their reputation, and then you file documents that are filled with untruths because of the sources that you filed,” Moeller said. “It just seems to me that everything about this case has been to divert the jury, divert the judges or to divert the public, for that matter, from truth. And you put those things all together in this case and it just doesn’t look good.”
A ruling will be issued at a later date.