July 17, 2025
MLFA Wins Reinstatement of Civil Case for South Florida Muslim Federation!
MLFA’s Civil Litigation attorneys scored a victory in federal court in Florida this week, for our client South Florida Muslim Federation (also known by the abbreviated version of its name, “SoFlo”). In October, we filed a lawsuit on its behalf against the Fort Lauderdale Marriott Coral Springs as well as several local south Florida individuals and organizations, for conspiring to and then canceling SoFlo’s contract for its annual convention. SoFlo didn’t violate the contract or miss payments or anything like that. Instead, local media and business officials, including Mayor of Parkland Rich Walker, pushed the hotel to cancel the contract, because they considered SoFlo’s members to present “significant undesirable interests” due to inflammatory claims of support for terrorism. In other words, they revived 9/11-era Islamophobia.
In May, the federal judge assigned to the lawsuit dismissed the case—holding that the negative characterizations of SoFlo members as terrorism supporters could not possibly be based on race. Most importantly, the judge denied SoFlo any chance to amend its Complaint. Plaintiffs nearly always have at least one opportunity to add or clarify their claims and supporting facts, by filing an amended complaint. So, in addition to disagreeing with the decision on the merits, MLFA’s Civil Litigation attorneys working the lawsuit—Christina Jump, Chelsea Glover, and Jinan Chehade—filed a motion asking the Court to reconsider its ruling, and at least allow SoFlo to amend its complaint.
And on Monday, July 14, the Court agreed to do exactly that.
The judge’s Order confirms that he did reconsider, and decided our team was probably right that refusing to allow SoFlo to clarify its claims “amounted to an abuse of discretion.” The judge also allowed our team to file its proposed amended complaint. With that permission, we filed SoFlo’s new updated complaint the next day!
“We are so happy for our client, and relieved to see the court correct its earlier error,” said Christina A. Jump, our Civil Litigation Department Head. “SoFlo never should have needed to file this case the first time, let alone a second time, but we will keep standing by our client for as long as justice in this case takes.”
Civil Litigation Senior Staff Attorney Chelsea Glover, who took the lead on the motion that made this possible and has been on the case from the start, agrees.
“We are glad the Court saw fit to reconsider its order that dismissed our complaint without leave to file an amended complaint. As our amended complaint demonstrates, SoFlo as an organization suffered racist and Anti-Muslim harassment that resulted in the last-minute unjustified cancelation of its annual conference. We look forward to obtaining justice for SFMF and defeating the Defendants’ arguments in court.”
Civil Litigation Junior Staff Attorney Jinan Chehade supports those sentiments, noting “SoFlo’s experience of racist and Islamophobic harassment is not an isolated one—it echoes the reality faced by many Muslim organizations across this country. This victory is a testament to the principle that the legal system cannot and will not accommodate hate.”
Congratulations to our client, all the members of SoFlo, and the whole Civil Litigation team who made this possible! Great job, all!
