WOOD v. MOSS

Legal Principle at Issue

Did the Secret Service unconstitutionally discriminate against protestors when asking one group to leave while allowing another to stay?

Action

The Supreme Court held unanimously that Secret Service agents are entitled to qualified immunity. In a decision authored by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Court emphasized that security decisions made by Secret Service agents protecting the President are often urgent and complex, and they should not be second-guessed in court absent clear evidence of unconstitutional conduct.

Facts/Syllabus

While campaigning for a second term, President George W. Bush was scheduled to spend the night at a cottage in Jacksonville, Oregon. Local law enforcement officials permitted a group of Bush supporters and a group of protesters to assemble on opposite sides of a street along the President’s motorcade route. When the President made a last-minute decision to have dinner at the outdoor patio area of the Jacksonville Inn’s restaurant before resuming the drive to the cottage, the protesters moved to an area in front of the Inn, which placed them within weapons range of the President. 

The supporters remained in their original location, where a two-story building blocked sight of the patio. At the direction of two Secret Service agents responsible for the President’s security, petitioners Tim Wood and Rob Savage, local police cleared the area where the protesters had gathered, eventually moving them two blocks away to a street beyond weapons reach of the President. The agents did not require the guests already inside the Inn to leave, stay clear of the patio, or go through a security screening. After the President dined, his motorcade passed the supporters, but the protesters, now two blocks from the motorcade’s route, were beyond his sight and hearing.

The protesters sued the agents for damages, alleging that the agents engaged in viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment when they moved the protesters away from the Inn but allowed the supporters to remain in their original location. The District Court denied the agents’ motion to dismiss the suit for failure to state a claim and on qualified immunity grounds. Howeer, on interlocutory appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed the lower court's decision, holding the protesters had failed to state a First Amendment claim under the pleading standards of Bell Atlantic v. Twombly and Ashcroft v. Iqbal. Because those decisions were rendered after the protesters commenced suit, the Ninth Circuit granted leave to amend the complaint. 

On remand, the protesters supplemented the complaint with allegations that the agents acted pursuant to an unwritten Secret Service policy of working with the Bush White House to inhibit the expression of disfavored views at presidential appearances. The District Court denied the agents’ renewed motion to dismiss. This time, the Ninth Circuit affirmed, concluding that viewpoint-driven conduct on the agents’ part could be inferred from the absence of a legitimate security rationale for the different treatment accorded the two groups of demonstrators. The Ninth Circuit further held that the agents were not entitled to qualified immunity because this Court’s precedent made clear that the government may not regulate speech based on its content.

Importance of Case

The Court's decision in Wood v. Moss reinforced the broad scope of qualified immunity for federal officers, particularly in sensitive security contexts, and clarified that viewpoint discrimination claims must be supported by clear evidence that the government’s actions were not based on legitimate, neutral justifications.