Placer candidate files defamation lawsuit against right-wing blogger and restaurant owner
Roseville City Councilman Scott Alvord is suing a conservative blogger and a local restaurateur, alleging they defamed him in posts linking him to forced COVID-19 vaccinations and calling him a “communist.”
He filed the lawsuit in Placer County Superior Court on Wednesday against Lincoln restaurant owner and Rocklin City Council candidate Matthew Oliver and Aaron Park, who manages RightOnDailyBlog.com. Neither Oliver nor Park has been served with a complaint.
Alvord alleges that the pair said the councilman forced children during the COVID-19 pandemic to vaccinate against the virus and wear face masks, and also accused the entrepreneur of being against small businesses.
He alleges their claims — particularly in blog posts and Facebook posts — harmed Alvord’s reputation and “may inhibit his livelihood,” per the lawsuit, which was first reported by Gold Country Media.
“When people just blatantly lie and their purpose is to undermine you and hurt your reputation, it’s wrong,” Alvord said in a phone interview on Thursday.
“They are purposefully trying to undermine my reputation. We have evidence that their goal is to take me down.”
He’s running to become supervisor of Placer County’s District 2, and has been a frequent target of Park’s blog on the Placer County political scene for years, since before 2020.
Park took aim on his blog in September after Alvord disclosed his plans to sue on social media. Park posted the council member’s Nextdoor exchange with a commenter on the site in which Alvord said he was “legally going after an attack blogger and a narcissist.” In the exchange, the councilman said Park and Oliver “have purposefully harmed me with knowingly false information.”
“It looks like Scott Alvord can’t handle the exposure on the Right on Daily Blog,” Park wrote in a Sept. 14 post. “I am not sure what sort of attorney would make Scott Alvord believe a lawsuit — especially in the middle of a campaign — is a good idea.”
Oliver, a pastor who owns three restaurants, gained notoriety in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic when he pushed back against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s public health orders by holding a “Newsom hour.” He announced his run for a seat on Rocklin City Council in June.
“This looks like the desperate attempt from a politician to try to gain headlines the week the ballots are dropped,” Oliver said on Thursday.
“He’s a public politician who’s made public statements who doesn’t like to take responsibility for them. ... He made comments, and now he’s not happy about them, and he’s trying to backpedal.”
Alvord as a public official, faces a high bar to win a defamation lawsuit under longstanding precedent. He’d have to show that Oliver and Park posted a false statement against him with “actual malice,” meaning a reckless disregard for facts.
Alvord said he’s grown tired of knocking on doors and hearing constituents repeat Oliver and Park’s accusations back to him.
“There are voters who literally think I forced families to get vaccines,” he said. “I don’t have any jurisdiction to do that. ... I own businesses, too, and saying I’m ‘anti-business’ is horrible.”
Alvord said “the timeline is unfortunate” and that filing a lawsuit while campaigning is not ideal. It took a long time to gather the evidence, he said, and he wants to clear his reputation before the election.
“I’m tired of being bulled by these guys,” he said. “It’s time to go court, to have a trial, and to put them in their place.”
This story was originally published October 15, 2022 at 5:30 AM.
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