On Friday, Florida’s First District Court of Appeals agreed to hear oral arguments in Navy veteran Zackary Young’s two defamation cases against The Associated Press and Puck News. The hearing comes after Judge William Scott Henry of Florida’s 14th Judicial Circuit threw out both cases back in August 2025. Now, there were positive signs for Young that the First DCA could breathe new life into his claims.
While they were each separate cases, the First DCA had opted to conduct the oral arguments simultaneously, according to the official notices of oral argument obtained by NewsBusters. Both cases were scheduled for Tuesday, June 9 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern.
The filings explained which judges would oversee the case and how time would be allotted:
The argument is scheduled before Judges Roberts, Winokur, and Treadwell, but the panel is subject to change. The Court has allotted 15 minutes per side. Multiple appellants or appellees, or petitioners or respondents, must share the allotted time and must notify the Court at the beginning of oral argument how their side’s time will be divided.
A possible good sign for Young, two of the judges who would hear the cases, Judges L. Clayton Roberts and Thomas D. Winokur sided with him to reaffirm that he could seek punitive damages in his successful defamation case against CNN.
Their overseeing of the case could be bad news particularly for the AP. Young’s argument against them centered on their use or alleged misuse of the phrase “human smuggling” to describe his efforts to rescue people from Afghanistan during the collapse. Citing the AP’s own style guide, Young points out that that word carries a criminal connotation when, as a matter of law ruled in the CNN case, he did not commit any crime.
During CNN’s appeal of punitive damages, months before trial, Judge Roberts called out the network for their use or lack-there-of of dictionaries when suggesting Young was operating a “black market”:
ROBERTS: Tell me how the Triad works.
TOBIN: The Triad, your honor, is a group of three different departments at CNN. It’s the Standards and Practices Department, it’s the Legal Department, and it’s the Editorial Department, they come together and –
ROBERTS: So, these are lawyers and professional writers that, you know, are used to dealing with words and have dictionaries and know how precise – what words mean?
TOBIN: One would presume, your honor, that they’re educated people that they’ve been in the business for a while. But your honor, there is nothing in the record discussing the word “blackmail” [sic] at all among any of the CNN journalists. And it is plaintiff’s burden.
Also pressing the importance for the definitions of words, Judge Winokur said this regarding the arguments being made by CNN’s counsel about the use of the word “black market” to describe Young’s efforts: “I hate to keep harping on this, but none of those things describe what could be commonly referred to as ‘black market.’ I see Judge Roberts’s point that ‘black market’ clearly implies dictionary definition or otherwise, an illegal exchange of goods.”
It appears that to them, words have meaning.
Another possibly good sign for Young was the cases being heard together.
In throwing out the cases, Judge Henry used similar language to dismiss them as one of those “movies or television shows, sequels, spinoffs or reboots” that “should not be made.” Adding: “Often times, the story line is forced, new characters are not properly developed, inconsistencies arise between the original plot and the sequel’s, or the writers and producers are just lazy trying to cash in on a previously successful idea. These same things can be said of this case.”
The use of such language in both rulings could have the judges’ attention in a bad way.
Interestingly, Judge Henry lost out to Judge Treadwell, the third appeals judge on Young’s cases, in a 2025 bid to be appointed to the First DCA by Governor Ron DeSantis following the CNN case.
As for the Puck case, while Judge Henry argued they did note Young won his case, the appellate judges could put a greater weight on their other comments. Ones where they suggested it was a bad sign for the country because it added to President Trump’s feud with the press and somehow a win for him too, and allegedly mischaracterized Young’s efforts in Afghanistan in a similar way to CNN.
To read NewsBusters’ complete coverage of Young’s defamation suit against CNN and the fallout cases, click here.
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