The complaint is civil, not criminal, filed in Pennsylvania state court. It seeks immediate abatement, which means that if Philadelphia wins, the Musk/America PAC high profile effort to collect personal information in exchange for a vague chance to win $1 million would shut down or be drastically overhauled right away. 2/

Strikingly, the grounds for the suit are not in election law. The first count against Musk/America PAC is for creating a public nuisance by operating a public lottery. The second count charges the defendants with deceiving and otherwise exploiting consumers, in violation of PA’s law against unfair and deceptive trade practices. 3/

Charging Musk/Am PAC with civil breach of consumer protection law and creating a public nuisance by running an illegal lottery is both entirely legally warranted and the right wing legal establishment’s worst nightmare. 4/

Public nuisance and consumer protection law are tools that states and cities have used to hold accountable opioid makers and distributors, irresponsible firearms manufacturers, and corporate polluters of the environment. They are the basis of some climate change lawsuits, such as the one against Chevron. 5/

The Federalist Society, ALEC, the National Association of American Manufacturers, and the National Shooting Sports Foundation are explicitly mounting systemic challenges to public nuisance and consumer protection statutes. This is their extension of their twentieth century attacks on tort law. They are trying to eliminate any civil accountability for those in trade and commerce and to allow people like Musk to interfere, without consequence, with public rights to public goods. 6/

The mere filing of Philadelphia’s complaint against M*sk/Am PAC on grounds of public nuisance and consumer protection will drive these groups and their members nuts. Even better, these legal theories fit M*sk/Am PAC’s conduct like a glove. 7/

Philadelphia points out three features of the M*sk/Am PAC $ for voter info program that make it an illegal lottery: it offers a cash prize; to a winner it advertises as being drawn at random; and receives in exchange from participants personal information and a pledge of future conduct to support certain positions. But, PA law explicitly prohibits lotteries not operated by the state to benefit those aged 65 and above. It explicitly says that unlawful lotteries are common nuisances. 8/

A common nuisance is a situation that interferes with the public’s right to a public good, for example, blocking a highway or dumping waste in the waterways. Conduct that endangers public welfare is often public nuisance. The Philadelphia complaint argues two interferences with public right. The more general one is the effect of illegal gambling rackets on the community as a whole. The one specific to this case notes that voting and elections are themselves public goods. 9/

The unfair and deceptive trade practices count likewise gets at the heart of what is legally objectionable about the M*sk/Am PAC lottery. The defendants seek personal data from lottery participants to benefit Am PAC’s marketing, campaigning, and data analytics operations. Participants lose control over this data. To get people to give it up, the lottery sponsors engage in false, misleading, exploitive conduct. 11/

M*sk/Am PAC do not post a complete set of rules for their lottery. They do not disclose range of payouts and how they will be delivered; the odds of winning; what happens to the personal data given up. They are offering bonuses to PA residents that are not being offered to other states where the lottery operates though there is no evidence any bonuses have been paid. In effect, Musk/Am PAC are running a scam as well as an illegal lottery. 12/

Oh, and that claim that winners are drawn at random? It is pretty dubious given that the winners so far just happen to be at the Trump rallies where there names are announced. Musk says they have no advance notice they have won. 13/