TAFUTO v. Michael Richard Pence, Defendant. (2020)

SUMMARY ORDER

Appellant Louis Tafuto, pro se, sues Donald J. Trump for President, Inc., Donald Trump, Reinhold Richard (“Reince”) Priebus, the Republican National Committee, Michael Pence, and Kellyanne Conway under 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 and 1985 and Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), alleging violations of the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments and the New York Fair Campaign Code. He alleges that the defendants engaged in a “digital gerrymandering” campaign to “dilute” anti-Trump votes by knowingly spreading Russian-backed disinformation in Democratic strongholds and swing states during the 2016 presidential election.

The district court dismissed the suit for lack of standing, ruling that Tafuto's injury was too generalized and that he had not established causation between the Trump campaign's alleged actions and the election result. The district court then denied Tafuto's Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) motion for reconsideration. This appeal followed.

We review the district court's dismissal of a complaint for lack of standing de novo. Cortlandt St. Recovery Corp. v. Hellas Telecomms. S.À.R.L., 790 F.3d 411, 417 (2d Cir. 2015). At the pleading stage, we “accept as true all material allegations of the complaint, and construe the complaint in favor of the complaining party.” Pennell v. City of San Jose, 485 U.S. 1, 7, 108 S.Ct. 849, 99 L.Ed.2d 1 (1988).¹ We review the denial of a Rule 59(e) motion for abuse of discretion.² Munafo v. Metro. Transp. Auth., 381 F.3d 99, 105 (2d Cir. 2004).

To establish standing, a plaintiff must demonstrate, first, an injury in fact—“an invasion of a legally protected interest which is (a) concrete and particularized, and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical”; second, “a causal connection between the injury and the conduct [he] complain[s] of”; and third, that it is “likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision.” Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–61, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992).

After careful review of the briefs and record on appeal, we find that the district court properly held that Tafuto does not assert an injury in fact that is concrete and particularized. “For an injury to be particularized, it must affect the plaintiff in a personal and individual way.” Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, ––– U.S. ––––, 136 S. Ct. 1540, 1548, 194 L.Ed.2d 635 (2016). In contrast, “when the asserted harm is a generalized grievance shared in substantially equal measure by all or a large class of citizens, that harm alone normally does not warrant exercise of jurisdiction.” Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 499, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975); see also Crist v. Comm'n on Presidential Debates, 262 F.3d 193, 195 (2d Cir. 2001) (“[A] voter fails to present an injury-in-fact when the alleged harm is abstract and widely shared․”). Here, Tafuto asserts that defendants’ digital gerrymandering campaign diluted anti-Trump votes and resulted in his vote “not carry[ing] equal weight to that of other citizens voting in the same election.” But these allegations assert an injury that was generalized and widely shared by millions of voters. The district court therefore did not err in determining that Tafuto did not suffer a cognizable injury-in-fact.

Tafuto further argues that Gill v. Whitford, ––– U.S. ––––, 138 S. Ct. 1916, 201 L.Ed.2d 313 (2018), supports his argument that he properly alleged standing. But Gill is inapposite. Gill held that partisan gerrymandering can constitute a cognizable injury for standing purposes when the plaintiff lives in a gerrymandered legislative district, but the Court specifically declined to extend its holding beyond the legislative district level, reasoning that the dilution of plaintiffs’ votes was “district specific” and that “[a] plaintiff who complains of gerrymandering, but who does not live in a gerrymandered district, asserts only a generalized grievance against governmental conduct of which he or she does not approve.” Id. at 1930. Gill, therefore, does not support Tafuto's assertion of a concrete and particularized injury.

As to causation, we also hold that the district court properly concluded that Tafuto does not allege an injury that is fairly traceable to the defendants’ challenged conduct. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130. Tafuto asserts that Trump's 2016 campaign insiders have effectively admitted in media interviews that the strategies that Tafuto here challenges resulted in Trump's victory. But the district court correctly cited Davis v. Garcia, No. 07-cv-9897 (CLB), 2008 WL 2229811 (S.D.N.Y. May 27, 2008), to find that Tafuto does not allege sufficient non-conclusory facts to establish causation. In Davis, an African American incumbent candidate who had lost reelection claimed that the defendants, county and federal officials and agencies, diluted the votes of minority voters by conducting a “widely publicized, racially motivated” raid of two city administrative offices shortly before the election. Id. at *3. The court rejected the voter dilution argument, reasoning that “[t]he endless number of diverse factors potentially contributing to the outcome of elections forecloses any reliable conclusion that voter support of a candidate is fairly traceable to any particular event,” and that it “would have to accept a number of very speculative inferences and assumptions” to find causation between the defendants’ conduct and the plaintiff's election loss. Id. at *5. Here, the district court properly relied on Davis for the truism that numerous factors can influence election outcomes—factors that undercut Tafuto's causation argument.

We further hold that the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Tafuto's Rule 59(e) motion. For substantially the same reasons as above, Tafuto cannot demonstrate that the district court overlooked controlling decisions or facts. We have also reviewed the remainder of Tafuto's arguments and find them to be without merit. For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Unless otherwise indicated, in quoting cases, all internal quotation marks, alterations, emphases, footnotes, and citations are omitted.

2.   Tafuto's notice of appeal refers only to the denial of his Rule 59(e) motion. However, we construe pro se notices of appeal “liberally, taking the parties’ intentions into account.” Shrader v. CSX Transp., Inc., 70 F.3d 255, 256 (2d Cir. 1995). Because Tafuto's brief on appeal addresses both the dismissal order and the denial of the Rule 59(e) motion, and because his notice of appeal is timely as to both, see Fed. R. App. P. 4(a)(4)(iv); Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e), we evaluate each of these decisions.