A bill to speed up the dismissal of frivolous lawsuits that target free speech and free press rights is still alive in the Iowa Legislature
Jared Strong
The Gazette offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced.
A rural Iowa county's effort to silence a frequent critic — by threatening a lawsuit against the retired school nurse — might have backfired.
Rita Audlehelm, a rural Decatur County resident in far southern Iowa, is considering her own lawsuit for an attempt to stifle her constitutionally protected free speech.
Most recently she was sharply critical of a county supervisor's repeated absences from board meetings and suggested he should be removed from elected office. Her words were published in a letter to the editor of a local newspaper.
"Like everyone here in America, Ms. Audlehelm has views on governance that are shared by some and disliked by others," wrote Brian Morris, an attorney for the Institute for Justice. "Thankfully, the First Amendment stands ready to protect our right to disagree with our elected officials."
Morris sent a letter Monday to the Decatur County attorney that asked him to publicly retract a litigation threat he made to Audlehelm in February.
The Virginia-based group is "dedicated to defending the constitutional rights of ordinary people living in America," Morris wrote.
Iowa state lawmakers have sought to limit meritless lawsuits that threaten First Amendment rights. There is pending legislation that was recently approved by the Iowa House that would allow for a quicker dismissal of such suits.
Their worry is that the lawsuits can inflict severe financial peril to those who are targeted even if the suits fail, because long-term litigation can result in tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees.
An absent supervisor
Supervisor Steve Fulkerson was a regular attendee of the board's meetings until October 2024, according to minutes of those meetings.
The month prior, Hurricane Helene tore into the southeastern United States and did its worst damage in Florida and Georgia.
Fulkerson made posts on Facebook that appeared to show him in Georgia helping with the cleanup. It's unclear whether he was volunteering his help or was paid.
Fulkerson declined to comment for this article.
Minutes show Fulkerson was not physically present for a supervisors meeting in October, November and most of December. In about half of the meetings he participated by phone or Zoom.
On Dec. 10, the then-county auditor made a Facebook post showing Fulkerson and her together at what appeared to be county offices. She called him "a local hero" for his work in Georgia.
Fulkerson responded in a comment: "Being gone for 59 days was long enough now back to work."
That comment incensed Audlehelm. An elected official can be removed from their post if they are gone from their county for 60 days.
Audlehelm thought he was cheekily flouting his official duties. Less than a week before the post she had complained to the county attorney about Fulkerson's absences and asked about declaring his position vacant.
Fulkerson attended a Dec. 23 meeting, but thereafter was again mostly absent in January, meeting minutes show.
So Audlehelm wrote a letter that was published by the Leon Journal-Reporter that questioned Fulkerson's absences and the lack of action by the two other board members to address them.
"Meanwhile Supervisor Fulkerson continues to receive salary, health insurance, and contributions to IPERS paid for by the citizens of Decatur County," Audlehelm wrote.
Decatur supervisors have an annual salary of about $32,000.
The threat
The same day Audlehelm's letter published in the newspaper, Decatur County Attorney Alan Wilson penned a "notice to cease and desist from making any future false, misleading or defamatory statements against any elected official of Decatur County" to Audlehelm.
"I'm advising all members of the Board of Supervisors to speak with their private legal counsel about the defamatory statements you have made against them, particularly if you don't retract (them) immediately," Wilson wrote in the letter, which Audlehelm provided to The Gazette.
It was printed with an “OFFICE OF THE DECATUR COUNTY ATTORNEY” letterhead.
Wilson specifically targeted Audlehelm's gripes about Fulkerson's meeting attendance, which Wilson claimed were "blatantly false" despite meeting records that showed otherwise.
Wilson did not respond to requests to comment for this article.
His letter shocked Audlehelm: "It's pretty scary when you get something that says all those things."
Audlehelm had been attending the supervisors' meetings regularly since 2023, after a dispute about the board's oversight of its public health department.
Later the supervisors declined to reappoint her to the county's health board, of which she had been a member for 30 years.
She chronicled her disputes with county officials in regular newspaper letters, according to copies of those letters she provided to The Gazette.
That included challenging their management of staff and money. She also asked them to better communicate their actions to the public and to livestream their meetings, which they now do.
She campaigned to be elected to the board last year but lost.
Fulkerson, who was not up for reelection, penned his own letter to the editor last year that claimed Audlehelm's "false narrative" was stoking "insults and disrespectful behavior."
He attributed her ire to not being reappointed to the health board, which she disputes.
Audlehelm was wary of the legal threat but defiantly opposed to publicly retracting her statements that she believed to be true. She contacted the Iowa Freedom of Information Council, which advocates for open government and occasionally challenges government officials in court.
"Even if her comments and questions hurt the feelings of county supervisors, the prosecutor had no business lecturing her or making a not-so-subtle threat of possible legal action against her," the group's executive director, Randy Evans, wrote in a February commentary that was published on several media websites.
Audlehelm said she has not heard anything further from county officials about the litigation threat.
Fulkerson, in a fleeting phone conversation with The Gazette, ended the call when asked whether he planned to file suit.
The counterthreat
Legislation that could expedite the dismissals of frivolous lawsuits that target free speech and free press rights — House File 472 — was unanimously approved by the Iowa House in March.
Iowa is among 14 states that do not have a so-called anti-SLAPP law, according to the Institute for Free Speech. The acronym stands for "strategic lawsuit against public participation."
The bill awaits a vote by the full Senate.
"Officials in Iowa are free to intimidate and silence Iowans because the state lacks" the law, the Institute for Justice said this week when it announced it was representing Audlehelm.
In a Monday letter to the Decatur County attorney and other county leaders, attorney Brian Morris said Audlehelm's assertions were backed by facts, and that court decisions have established people should be able to express their opinions about government.
"The deficiencies in your letter reveal the board's true nature: To intimidate and silence Ms. Audlehelm," Morris wrote.
He urged Wilson to retract his February letter to Audlehelm and "publicly acknowledge that Ms. Audlehelm has a First Amendment right to criticize the board of supervisors" in newspapers.
If Wilson doesn't, Audlehelm said she might sue.
"That's an option," she told The Gazette. "We'll have to see what they say."
Comments: (319) 368-8541; [email protected]