U.S. District Court, District of Utah · 2:24-cv-00876-DBB-JCB · Federal

Sunwest Bank v. Gannett Co. and Journal Sentinel

Granted in part UPEPA

Forum: U.S. District Court, District of Utah
Case number: 2:24-cv-00876-DBB-JCB
Motion decided: Sep 22, 2025
Outcome: Granted in part
Underlying case: Still going. The court has asked the Utah Supreme Court to settle a legal question before the case can continue.
Conduct at issue: Newspaper reporting on a bank's dealings with a Mexican financial institution during its CEO's U.S. Senate campaign
Underlying claims: Defamation, defamation per se, defamation by implication, false light

What the court held

Judge David Barlow applied the two-step framework from UHS of Provo Canyon v. Bliss; Sunwest did not dispute that UPEPA applies. All defamation theories failed: statements about Banco Azteca were not about Sunwest, the political operative's statements were protected opinion and hyperbole in an ongoing campaign dispute, the statements about Sunwest were not capable of defamatory meaning in the article's political context, and the $26.2 million statement's gist was true. The false light claim survived because the movants' briefing did not establish that Utah bars corporate false light claims. Dismissal ran without prejudice: the movants conceded, and the court accepted, that UPEPA's with-prejudice command conflicts with the Federal Rules and does not apply in federal court. On February 5, 2026 the court certified to the Utah Supreme Court whether a corporate entity can bring a false light claim under Utah law; reconsideration of the merits order was denied May 6, 2026.