Depending on the state, if the company filed a claim it knew it would lose for the purpose of wasting the defendent's resources, the defendant could retaliate with an anti-SLAPP lawsuit to recover damages and attorney's fees.

It might be useful to include the now-established practice of XYZsucks.com.

@IllusiveBrian that is true, but you only recover the resources AFTERWARDS iirc. So it may still be tough going for a bit.

wait - you need to spend time and money on something like this in the US? I would have though that if its obvious the lawsuit of the company has no ground, you wouldnt have to fear losing money - at least in germany, the one who loses the lawsuit has to pay for the costs, as far as i know

@FlyingThunder Yes, it's a common strategy in N-America to intimidate people who are perceived as a hindrance to the company. Power is with the wealthy, including legal power.

Possession is nine tenths of the law. Possession of cash even more so. A lawsuit can be deemed frivolous but that will still not be without cost in time and money for the person or organization that is being sued.

Note that there is strong pressure in the US to ban boycotts of Israel or Israeli companies (but not any other state, even the US itself). This already includes some state level laws.

@FlyingThunder So individuals and small companies will be too scared to even start a lawsuit against a large company or fight a large company with deep pockets and large expenses.

Worth noting, if your website is run as an individual, not a business, it makes any defamation claim harder as it is more likely to be seen as being protected by freedom of speech.

@pjc50 Yes, and hopefully it spurs more vocal and widespread boycotts so that some state finally exercises their plainly unconstitutional laws and gets slapped down by SCOTUS.

@Josef In England and Wales you can come to a conditional fees arrangement with your solicitor (they only get paid if you win). Obviously in this case they will want to make sure that winning if very likely - but I know that (for example) Carter Ruck do conditional fee agreements for defamation cases.

@Martin Bonner In the US such arrangements, called contingent fees, are common for plaintiffs, but not for defendants, such as the OP might be in a case like the one described here. Is that different in England and Wales?

@DavidSiegel I don't know if they are common, but they happen: pressgazette.co.uk/…

@Martin Bonner I am surprised. The plaintiff hopes to get a sizable award of damages, and a fee can be paid out of that. But a wining defendant doesn't get an award. Where does the money for fees come from in such a case?

@FlyingThunder This may be legal theory, but practice can vary. In Austria we had a highly publicized recent case where the attorney of state accused an annoying left-wing group of "terrorism" (a trial that was doomed right from the start, as literally the only thing they had proof for was that they destroyed a garbage bin at some point). They managed to stretch out the process over many months before it was thrown out, stranding the defendants with hundreds of thousands of EURs in defence costs.

@FlyingThunder An appeal to the European High Court for reimbursement of the costs was recently thrown out as well.

@DavidSiegel A winning defendant does get an award. The losing claimant has to pay the defendants legal fees (usually). In E&W the loser nearly always has to pay the winner's legal fees.

@MartinBonner That's not an award, that's returning where you started. And even that's questionable: if it takes months to win the case, then for months you are without that money, which has numerous opportunity costs that can affect a poorer person or company's life in a significant way while being largely brushed off and irrelevant to anyone of adequate wealth. That's one of the problems with the wealth disparity and why patent trolls etc. are a thing: even cases you are guaranteed to win still cost you something in time and opportunities, incentivizing you to settle a meritless claim.