As we gear up for another five months of mudslinging political ads, it could be good to pause, reflect and remember those who have come before.

Yes, there were massages and turtle tunnels and boys being boys during our recent primary, but it is rare 2-year-old ads hang around to haunt people.

Except for Bob Beers, Allison Copening and the Democratic Party of Nevada.

Beers alleges in a defamation suit that Copening and the Dems falsely stated in campaign advertisements in 2008 that then-state senator Beers was “under ethics commission review.” Beers says he was not under scrutiny and felt the collusion between the party and Copening tainted his record. It may have been the reason he lost and Copening goes to Carson City.

Today in Clark County District Court, the Democrats’ lawyer was on the defensive from Judge Bonnie Bula. Dem attorney Tony DiRaimondo wanted a protective order for depositions during the discovery phase of the trial.

DiRaimondo and the Dems are concerned that in depositions, Beers’ attorneys could ask specific questions to reveal “internal party workings” and campaign strategy used to win in 2008.

“That’s confidential information; that’s commercial information; that’s proprietary information,” he said.

He compared the possible outing of information in depositions to “Coke suing Pepsi” and the chance to ever-so-conveniently compel them to reveal the secret formula under oath.

The order would have barred Beers attorney Chad Dennie from specific questions and focus only on the creation of the ads and defamation. Dennie countered, saying everything was essentially fair game until he got answers to his questions.

“I want to find out why it was made, how it was done — who paid for it,” Dennie said.

Judge Bulla chilled to the idea of blocking questions and topics preemptively. “I really don’t like being in the position to allow prior restraint,” she said. The concern is that a protective order could be broad and keep questions and truth from coming out.

The fears of revealing the Democratic party playbook were fair, but that the attorneys needed to make sure depositions stayed away from strategy questions. Dennie vowed to focused on the issues of any false statements used to create the ads.

Bulla denied the motion for protective order. Now if DiRaimondo worries questions are getting too close to inappropriate topics, he can call Bulla each time to get approval or denial of the question. He had hoped a protective order would keep that from happening.

The trial starts in August.

Tags: allison, beers, bob, bulla, coke, copening, defamation, Democrats, dennie, diraimondo, lawsuit, pepsi

Categories: Clark County Politics, State Politics