We need federal anti-SLAPP law: Scientist wins summary judgment on Splenda's defamation & related claims

TC Heartland LLC v. Schiffman, 2026 WL 1785093, No. 1:23-CV-665 (M.D.N.C. Jun. 22, 2026)

In a time of rising authoritarianism, it’s not that surprising seeing companies following the lead of Trump, Musk, and the like in suing their critics whose research implicates them in harm. Here, in the absence of a strong anti-SLAPP regime that could have shifted the costs onto the plaintiff, the defendant counterclaimed for defamation, but both sides lose because the proper realm for resolving scientific disputes is the audience of scientists.

Heartland sells Splenda, an artificial sweetener made with sucralose. Dr. Susan Schiffman said things about her research about sucralose, which was published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, so it sued her for defamation/trade libel (the differences don't matter here). Dr. Schiffman challenged Heartland’s online assertions impugning her scholarship and integrity, so she asserted defamation claims and an abuse of process claim. Bottom line:

Both Dr. Schiffman and Heartland have a First Amendment right to express their views on the safety and health effects of Splenda and sucralose and on the meaning and validity of research investigating those health and safety issues. Neither party has produced sufficient evidence to overcome the other’s First Amendment right to talk about the research and the conclusions to draw from the scientific research, and neither has shown a disputed question of material fact.

A bit more background: “In 2023, Dr. Schiffman, a professor at North Carolina State University, and coauthors published an article about the effects of sucralose and sucralose-6-acetate (“S6A”) in a peer-reviewed journal.” A hired lab did the experiments, not Dr. Schiffman herself. After the article was published, Dr. Schiffman worked with N.C. State to issue a press release about her research, which did mention Splenda; local news stations interviewed her about the article, and she discussed Splenda in those interviews, and a few other news sources reported on the article and published stories with her statements about her research. “In summary, she said that her research showed that sucralose carries multiple potential health risks, and she identified sucralose with Splenda.”

In response, “Heartland created a webpage disputing her article’s findings, her statements about the article, and the article’s implications. It impugned the quality of her research and essentially accused her of being a publicity hound.”

To prevail on a defamation claim under North Carolina law, the plaintiff must establish: (1) the defendant made a false, defamatory statement; (2) the statement was “of or concerning” the plaintiff; (3) the statement was published to a third party; and (4) the statement caused injury to the plaintiff’s reputation. For public figures, actual malice is required.

“Scientific conclusions based on research and speech about that research do not fit easily into the fact-opinion paradigm.” Scientific speech “receives First Amendment protection under certain conditions to encourage legitimate debate about scientific issues and to encourage discussion and research into matters of public and scientific interest.” [The Supreme Court has been extremely uninterested in identifying a category of “professional speech” that can be more heavily regulated. It’s hard to say whether the Court would be more amenable to “scientific speech” as a category that can be less regulated.] Although most conclusions in a scientific journal article are, in principle, “capable of verification or refutation by means of objective proof,” the court quoted ONY at length:

it is the essence of the scientific method that the conclusions of empirical research are tentative and subject to revision, because they represent inferences about the nature of reality based on the results of experimentation and observation. Importantly, those conclusions are presented in publications directed to the relevant scientific community, ideally in peer-reviewed academic journals that warrant that research approved for publication demonstrates at least some degree of basic scientific competence. These conclusions are then available to other scientists who may respond by attempting to replicate the described experiments, conducting their own experiments, or analyzing or refuting the soundness of the experimental design or the validity of the inferences drawn from the results.... Needless to say, courts are ill-equipped to undertake to referee such controversies. Instead, the trial of ideas plays out in the pages of peer-reviewed journals, and the scientific public sits as the jury.

Here, both parties were public figures, at least limited-purpose ones; indeed, “[t]he argument that Heartland is not a limited-purpose public figure borders on the ridiculous.”

Heartland purportedly only challenged the post-study comments, e.g., “A new study finds a chemical formed when we digest a widely used sweetener is ‘genotoxic,’ meaning it breaks up DNA. The chemical is also found in trace amounts in the sweetener itself, and the finding raises questions about how the sweetener may contribute to health problems....”; “Our work suggests that the trace amounts of sucralose-6-acetate in a single, daily sucralose-sweetened drink exceed that threshold [of toxicological concern]”; “When we exposed sucralose and sucralose-6-acetate to gut epithelial tissues – the tissue that lines your gut wall – we found that both chemicals cause ‘leaky gut.’ … A leaky gut is problematic, because it means that things that would normally be flushed out of the body in feces are instead leaking out of the gut and being absorbed into the bloodstream”; “We found that gut cells exposed to sucralose-6-acetate had increased activity in genes related to oxidative stress, inflammation and carcinogenicity”; “[a single packet of Splenda or in one drink exceeds] the level used in the food industry and in Europe, at the European food agencies, to say that this is too much genotoxic compound in the food supply. And so a single packet is too much”; “Risk wise, sucralose is worse [compared to other artificial sweeteners]”; and “basically, the data shows it’s not a good idea to consume sucralose.”

It was undisputed “that she made those statements following the publication of a scientific article she coauthored and that her remarks were directed to summarizing and explaining her research results to a lay audience.” Given that courts are “careful when applying defamation and related causes of action to academic works, because academic freedom is a ‘special concern of the First Amendment,’ ” “scientific conclusions are protected speech to the extent they are ‘draw[n] ... from non-fraudulent data, based on accurate descriptions of the data and methodology underlying those conclusions, on subjects about which there is legitimate ongoing scientific disagreement.’ ” [The court explicitly noted that its conclusion would not necessarily apply to a consumer-facing ad.] Accurate “secondary statements,” whether in a journal article, podcast, or other media, “do not form the basis for a libel claim.” This could be resolved as a matter of law.

The secondary statements would only be actionable if they were inaccurate descriptions of the article or the article was based on fraudulent data. Heartland did not show that either limit applied.

The challenged statements were accurate summaries of the article, which said things like “Overall, the . . . findings for sucralose-6-acetate raise significant health concerns regarding the safety and regulatory status of sucralose itself”; “Data indicate the sucralose-6-acetate is genotoxic,” and “sucralose-6-acetate significantly increased expression of genes associated with inflammation, oxidative stress, and cancer.”

Heartland argued that “Dr. Schiffman did not sufficiently qualify her conclusions as preliminary or note the lack of definitive assessment as to toxicity in humans.” But Dr. Schiffman used qualifying language in the N.C. State press release such as “the finding raises questions about how the sweetener may contribute to health problems,” “our work suggests that,” and “raises a host of concerns.” The university press release said that the article relied on “in vitro” experiments and tests. “Even in the three-minute news interview, Dr. Schiffman was not definitive; she said that S6A ‘can’ have negative health effects”; the interview specifically referenced the article.  “Thus, in a shorter fashion and directed to a lay audience, her secondary statements repeat the conclusions that she made in the article based on the studies detailed in the article.”

What about nuance? “To the extent Heartland is saying that the secondary statements are not nuanced enough, that argument if adopted would essentially prohibit scientists from commenting on sophisticated research to a lay audience beyond reading their study results in full. And Dr. Schiffman’s secondary statements were not so over-simplified as to be inaccurate.”

Heartland pointed to Dr. Schiffman’s answer to the question “How much Splenda or sucralose needs to be consumed in order for this to be harmful?”: “a single packet ... is too much.” In context, this was opinion, and consistent with statements in the article discussing “significant health concerns regarding the safety ... of sucralose itself,” discussing the potential genotoxicity of “a single daily sucralose-sweetened drink” and “single servings of sucralose,” and the like. It was irrelevant that she didn’t test Splenda; Splenda is made of sucralose.

Nor was there sufficient evidence of fraudulent data or inaccurate descriptions of data. The purported inaccuracy came from Heartland’s “disagreements with her results, methodology, and decisions about what to include in and omit from her published research.” “But omitting data does not necessarily make research fraudulent.” There was no evidence that the numbers in the studies were made up or that the tests were not conducted. “Heartland and others can run their own tests following the same methodology or using methodology they say is better or more complete, and they are free to use their results to publicly rebut Dr. Schiffman’s results if that is what such research shows.”

Heartland also pointed to an investigation by N.C. State, Dr. Schiffman’s employer, into Dr. Schiffman’s research, which seems to have been prompted by Heartland’s threats. “According to the investigation report, a vice chancellor convened a panel of professors to investigate whether Dr. Schiffman committed research misconduct based on Heartland’s allegations in this case that she (1) omitted contradictory data and (2) did not disclose conflicting repeat tests.” The committee concluded that Dr. Schiffman did not follow “best practices” because she “should have reported the negative Multiflow data from Litron Laboratories in the article” and that a discussion of the reason behind the differing results “would have been appropriate and ... followed best practices.” The committee stated that the exclusion of some data “should have been discussed with all coauthors of the article.” But all of that tended to put the article in the firmly protected category, since these were scientific differences and not fraud: the report unanimously concluded that Dr. Schiffman did not commit “research misconduct” because she provided a reason for the omission. “Failing to use best practices does not equate to fraud, and nothing in this report supports Heartland’s assertion that Dr. Schiffman used fraudulent data or did not accurately describe the data and methodology underlying those conclusions.”

In the alternative, Heartland failed to show actual malice. Its evidence of malice was: the omissions; a third-party scientist’s opinion that Dr. Schiffman had bias towards the research outcome because she omitted test results; funding she received from the Sugar Association over 15 years ago; and an email about seeking funding broadly from different entities for her research. None of this evidence was sufficient to convince a finder of fact that Dr. Schiffman “in fact entertained serious doubts as to the truth of [her] publication.”  Specifically, the evidence about funding was “too remote and speculative to permit an inference that she acted with malice in making the secondary statements.” In this context, “[m]ore papers, more discussion, better data, and more satisfactory models—not larger awards of damages—mark the path toward superior understanding of the world around us.”

The counterclaims failed for similar reasons. Some of Heartland’s criticisms were protected opinion, including that the article was “not sound science,” which is vague and encompasses many meanings. Others were scientific conclusions on a “subject about which there is legitimate ongoing scientific disagreement.”

The court also rejected an abuse of process counterclaim, even though “[a]nyone who delves into the record and procedural history of this case would easily have suspicions about Heartland’s motives.” Which is why we need a federal anti-SLAPP law.

Indeed, the court says that “[t]he First Amendment does not require a scientist to defend research studies in court merely because a company whose sales of a product might be affected by publicity about that research disagrees with the research or dislikes the publicity.” But … she did have to defend her research studies in court, in part because Heartland faced no real threat that it would have to pay for her defense—imposing costs on her was a rational business decision. An anti-SLAPP law might have given Heartland pause, and would definitely have made it easier for her to find good counsel.