CV NEWS FEED // Texas Attorney General Paxton has just won a major victory for pregnancy centers in lawsuit against Yelp.
According to a press release, Paxton filed a lawsuit against the online referral platform Yelp in September 2023 after the company “violat[ed] Texas’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act by adding inaccurate and misleading language to the app’s listings of pregnancy resource centers that provide assistance to pregnant mothers.”
The release continued:
Yelp attached warnings to some listings, deceptively disparaging facilities that counsel pregnant women instead of providing abortions.
Yelp’s CEO even boasted in a press release that he would use his company to encourage abortion and provide special assistance to groups attempting to subvert Texas’s pro-life laws.
Following the 2022 Dobbs decision, Yelp’s CEO released a statement saying he would “take action,” and “select organizations that are fighting the legal battle against abortion bans,” and provide them with special assistance.
“We need more business leaders to use their platform and influence to help ensure that reproductive rights are codified into law,” he stated at the time.
Paxton’s office initially sent Yelp a pre-suit notice, after which the company filed a preemptive suit against the Attorney general.
The company then sought after a preliminary injunction “to halt the State’s actions,” but the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California denied the motion and dismissed the case.
“Yelp cannot mislead and deceive the public simply because the company disagrees with our state’s laws,” Attorney General Paxton said in response to the ruling, adding: “I’m pleased that the court agreed with Texas that Yelp’s federal lawsuit was a frivolous attempt to avoid enforcement for misleading consumers.”
As CatholicVote previously reported, Paxton’s cause generated significant support from the attorneys general from 16 states after the lawsuit became public.
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