Let’s say that an event is schedule for, oh I dunno, April 20, 2027. If someone has (or believes they have) legal standing, and grounds, to sue to stop it, is there a deadline before which it’s too late to sue?
I ask because a lawsuite was filed on June 6 to stop an event planned for June 14. The event had been on the books for weeks if not months prior, and the plaintiff could have filed before time, effort and money were put into it (more and more by the day as the deadline approaches).
I can’t give particulars about laws which I’m sure vary from place to place, but my understanding from previous reading is that few jurisdictions would give much credence to the legal reasoning that an illegal event be given a free pass because canceling it would be inconvenient for the people staging an illegal event.
Presuming it’s not illegal, has the necessary permits, etc. - or any action one party is taking, event or whatever - what is the law on timing? Is there a valid argument “we spent all this money preparing to do X, you knew we were going to do it, and then sued at the last moment.” Would that party have a claim for reimbursement if the action is stopped? I could see that an injunction would have to take into account money spent that may be wasted as a damage the injunction could cause, and therefore one reason to not issue it.
It’s all a bit generic so it’s hard to say. But presumably if it’s the kind of event that needed a permit from the city/county, the process of getting the permit has some kind procedure for local people to object? If the people now suing did not object back when the permit was issued they will count against them now they are suing at the last minute?
Just a data point since the OP mentioned Trump’s UFC event. The lawsuit specifically states that the required permits were not sought, nor were other precursors like environmental review.
The extremely unusual facts behind this lawsuit and this event make it almost impossible to extrapolate or compare to other more generic events.
[Moderating]
This doesn’t sound like a hypothetical, which means you need professional legal advice, which means this is getting moved to IMHO.
Oh it’s about Trump’s ufc fight. Yeah that’s on Trump. He doesn’t own the place he’s just using it for a while. It would be no different if you organize a wrestling match in the Airbnb and sell tickets, but the owner finds out the morning of the match, cancels the whole thing and chucks you out. The ticket holders aren’t going to be able to get their ticket money back from the owner, they can only sue you to get their money back.
Well for starters, I never specifically said it was about the UFC thing, but yeah. I just figured I’d avoid poisoning the well right out of the gate.
I think there’s a difference between something a random guest at an Airbnb is doing (something likely to escape the attention of the landlord until the last minute) vs. something the POTUS is doing, which has received coverage in numerous media outlets and is out in the public eye. I’m not aware of any specific lawsuit involving Trump and the UFC event, but in general, my opinion is that waiting until the last minute to file a lawsuit (as opposed to doing so because one wasn’t aware of some possibly illegal event until the last minute) is an asshole move, and should be smacked down hard by the courts.
It might be that they tried other methods to stop it first, and only resorted to the courts when that didn’t work.
Nope, it’s called a winning move; don’t give the other side enough time to remedy whatever deficiency & they have no choice but to not hold it.
I know someone involved with local politics; I was in his business for something I needed one day when some other political apparatchik came in & they started talking. They were able to dig up dirt on someone running; that even though she had owned a home in the district for some time she hadn’t changed her legal address to that address in advance of the legally required # of days/weeks/months to obtain residency in advance of the election. Their plan was to wait until a week or two to raise it to the election board, on the very last day possible. She would be disqualified, there wouldn’t be time for that party to get a replacement candidate in one hour or less that the party would find out that she couldn’t run & his candidate would win office on a technicality because there was no one running against his candidate as the chance of a coordinated write-in candidate for some local BS office is next to nil. Had they said something when they learned about it, the other party would have had time to get a replacement candidate.
There’s a reason it’s called “Dirty Politics”!
Exactly. It’s a dirty move, mostly because there’s nothing about suing at the last minute that restricts it to politics. There could very well be some cases where it might be used for good, but it’s something that could easily be abused. Pride parade going through downtown that you don’t like? Sue at the last minute. Don’t want “those people” voting? Sue at the last minute before Election Day due to some supposed problem with the poling site. Neighbor getting a new roof / deck / porch / necessary work done that you don’t like? Sue at the last minute, or better yet, once the work has actually started, to hinder their project and cause them major inconvenience. And so on. Those would all be asshole moves, and I can imagine numerous other scenarios where that would apply as well.
It could backfire, though. Just suing, in itself, doesn’t stop anything: You need the court decision to do that. And if the court decision doesn’t come until after the event, it doesn’t matter what it was.
The court might expedite their decision to get it in before the event, but then again, they might not, and they might even use your late filing as an element in that decision.