A federal court in New York has scheduled a hearing June 10 regarding a lawsuit against Major League Baseball over its move of this season’s All-Star game out of Atlanta.
The lawsuit, filed Monday by conservative small-business advocacy organization Job Creators Network in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks the return of the game to Atlanta and $100 million in damages to local and state small businesses. The suit also seeks $1 billion in punitive damages.
MLB, the MLB Players Association, Commissioner of Baseball Rob Manfred and MLBPA executive director Tony Clark are named as defendants in the suit.
U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni ordered next week’s hearing for defendants to “show cause ... why an order should not be issued pursuant to Rule 65 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure enjoining the Defendants during the pendency of this action from holding the 2021 Major League Baseball All-Star Game at Coors Field in Denver, Colorado, on July 13, 2021, and requiring Defendants to immediately transfer the game back to Truist Park in Cobb County, Georgia, where it was originally scheduled to be played.”
Alfredo Ortiz, president and CEO of the Job Creators Network, said in a statement Wednesday: “JCN and its allies are looking forward to next week’s hearing and successfully resolving this case to the satisfaction of the Greater Atlanta community.”
MLB announced April 2 that it was moving the All-Star game out of Georgia in response to the state’s new voting law and announced several days later that the event will be held in Denver.
