Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton secured an appellate court victory against Yelp Inc. in litigation regarding the company’s alleged attempt to steer Texas users away from pro-life pregnancy centers and resources.
Paxton filed suit against Yelp in 2023 after his office says the company added misleading notices to the pages of crisis pregnancy centers in an attempt to divert Texans from pro-life providers. A trial court, however, dismissed the lawsuit, arguing that Texas lacked jurisdiction over the California-based company.
But the Fifteenth Court of Appeals reversed that dismissal Oct. 16 and held that businesses, including online businesses, that target Texas consumers cannot escape accountability merely because they are headquartered outside of the state.
“Yelp tried to play politics and steer users away from pro-life resources, but being based in the criminal-loving state of California will not shield them from accountability,” Paxton said. “I will continue to defend pro-life organizations that serve Texans and make sure that women and families are receiving accurate information about our state’s resources.”
Paxton said his office will continue to hold Yelp accountable under Texas law and ensure that “Texans receive accurate information when seeking help and pro-life services.”
After the Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs decision concluded that there is no constitutional right to an abortion, Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman issued a lengthy public statement expressing a self-professed need to “take action.” He said Yelp provides special assistance to “select organizations that are fighting the legal battle against abortion bans” and attempted to rally the business community behind the pro-abortion cause, stating, “We need more business leaders to use their platform and influence to help ensure that reproductive rights are codified into law.”
Paxton says Stoppelman is entitled to his views on abortion, but “he was not entitled to use the Yelp platform to deceptively disparage facilities that counsel pregnant women instead of providing abortions.”
The AG’s office says Yelp appended language to all pregnancy resource center Yelp pages, indicating that those pages “typically provide limited medical services and may not have licensed medical professionals onsite.”
The office says that disclaimer is misleading and often untrue because pregnancy resource centers frequently do provide medical services with licensed medical professionals onsite. Moreover, when informed by pregnancy resource centers that this statement was untrue, Paxton’s office alleges Yelp left up the misleading disclaimer on those centers’ Yelp pages until reproached by Paxton earlier this year.
The AG says Yelp’s disclaimer is particularly deceptive because it is in fact abortion providers that often do not have licensed medical professionals onsite, but the company did not append this disclaimer to abortion providers’ Yelp pages.
