Wood v. Mike Bloomberg 2020, Inc.
- Laura Swain
- 1:20-cv-02489
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Wood v. Mike Bloomberg 2020, Inc., Judge Swain granted the Campaign’s stay and held summary-judgment motions until class certification.
The Campaign and the plaintiffs are affected by the stay, the postponement of the summary-judgment motions until after class certification, and the ruling on whether those motions may later be supplemented or amended.
What happened
In Wood v. Mike Bloomberg 2020, Inc., the Campaign asked the court to pause pretrial deadlines and the trial while the parties’ summary-judgment motions were pending. The plaintiffs did not oppose pausing the pretrial deadlines but asked the court to limit the stay and allow changes to their summary-judgment motions later.
The court granted the Campaign’s request to stay all pretrial deadlines and the trial until it resolves the cross-motions for summary judgment. It also held the summary-judgment motions in abeyance, meaning they will remain pending, until the court decides the class-certification motion.
Judge Swain granted the plaintiffs’ requests in part and denied them in part. The request to supplement or amend the summary-judgment motions was denied without prejudice to renewal after the class-certification decision if the court does not resolve both motions at the same time.
The detailed version
- Wood v. Mike Bloomberg 2020, Inc. · No. 1:20-cv-02489
- Laura Swain
- Apr. 22, 2024
Background
Defendant Mike Bloomberg 2020, Inc., which the order calls the “Campaign,” moved to stay all pretrial deadlines and the trial until the court resolved the parties’ cross-motions for summary judgment. Plaintiffs did not oppose a stay of the pretrial deadlines, but asked that the stay last only until the court decided their motion for class certification. They also asked the court to hold the summary-judgment motions in abeyance until after the class-certification decision and to allow the parties to supplement or amend those motions if necessary.
Court’s Analysis
The court explained that a district court has discretion to pause proceedings to manage its docket efficiently. After considering the relevant interests of the parties, the court, nonparties, and the public, it found that a stay until the cross-motions for summary judgment were resolved was appropriate.
The court also chose to follow the usual sequence of deciding class certification before deciding the merits. It therefore held the cross-motions for summary judgment in abeyance until the class-certification motion was resolved. But the court found that plaintiffs had not provided a reason to let the parties supplement or amend their summary-judgment motions afterward.
Disposition
The Campaign’s request to stay all pretrial deadlines and the trial pending resolution of the cross-motions for summary judgment was granted. Plaintiffs’ requests were granted in part and denied in part: the request to hold the summary-judgment motions in abeyance until the class-certification motion was resolved was granted, while the request for an opportunity to supplement or amend the motions was denied without prejudice to renewal after the class-certification decision if the court does not resolve the class-certification and summary-judgment motions simultaneously.
After the summary-judgment decision, the parties must request a conference with Magistrate Judge Gorenstein within 30 days to discuss outstanding discovery, settlement, and other pretrial issues. This order resolved docket entry no. 453. The court did not decide the underlying claims or the merits of the summary-judgment motions in this order.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.