Thread by @KlasfeldReports

In other #1A news, Rep. Nunes' lawsuit against CNN heads for a hearing soon.

The Trump-loyalist congressman sent the network 28 discovery requests seeking "all notes, communications, and other documents" about their reporting.

Live tweet of that hearing ahead, @CourthouseNews.

This is the first hearing since Nunes' lawsuit was transferred to SDNY.

Nunes puts CNN's concerns of the case's threat to "'freedom' of the press" in scare quotes.

Doc with both parties' position: documentcloud.org/documents/6955…

The attorneys on the line:

For Nunes:

* Steven Biss
* Jeremy Zenilman

For CNN:
* Stephen Fuzesi & Kevin Taylor Baine
from firm Williams & Connolly

* Stephanie Abruty, from Warner Media

U.S. Magistrate Judge Ona Wang presiding.

CNN's attorney Stephen Fuzesi tells her that the network's pending motion to dismiss is "fully briefed."

Team Nunes has permission to file another brief on July 20.

The network will respond by Aug. 14.

Judge Wang moves onto CNN motion to stay the case.

For CNN, Fuzesi says: "This case is really a poster child I think for when discovery should be stayed."

"It's a strong motion that should be granted, and if it's granted, it will resolve this entire matter," he adds.

CNN's Fuzesi notes the case implicates important First Amendment issues.

"Your honor, this is really a remarkable lawsuit," he notes, explaining it is a case by a U.S. congressman against a news organization covering the impeachment of a president.

"Even beyond CNN's newsgathering," Fuzesi says that involves a president, members of congress, staffers, Ukrainian officials, Nunes' political opponent and others.

Even Joe Biden is on the list.

Fuzesi: "There is no reason to open this can of worms unless we really have to."

Adding to that, Fuzesi says, the coronavirus pandemic makes discovery more difficult.

He says the calculus weighs "overwhelmingly" in CNN's favor.

Nunes' lawyer Steven Biss says defamation isn't protected and CNN has not yet disputed the substance of Nunes' allegations.

Pushing back, Judge Wang notes that the litigation isn't at the stage where the network would do that.

Nunes sued CNN over reporting that the rep met with Ukraine’s former prosecutor general Victor Shokin in Austria last year to get dirt on Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

"Either Congressman Nunes was in Vienna, or he wasn't," Biss says. "He either met Shokin, or he didn't."

To support Nunes' claim that he wasn't, Biss cites an OAN interview with Shokin.

So OAN just got a federal court citation via a U.S. congressman's lawyer.

CNN's Stephen Fuzesi responds:

"CNN certainly contests allegations of actual malice. It certain contests allegations of false and defamatory statements."

The notion that CNN concedes otherwise has "no basis."

Fuzesi scoffs at Nunes' argument that First Amendment concerns in a lawsuit by a U.S. congressman against a news organization over coverage of an impeachment is somehow a "red herring."

News organizations should not be ordered to turn over privileged journalistic material before a motion to dismiss has been decided, he adds.