Oh, How They Would Love To Sue Sacha Baron Cohen

But their chance of prevailing is not good, according to this New York Times article. He is a great actor and a merciless con man, but he almost never says anything bad-cum-actionable about the people he lures into the thicket. They tend to hang themselves, at times in a way that leaves viewers in near disbelief (as in this routine where he convinces some prominent gun rights advocates and politicians that he is “Colonel Erran Morad,” an Israeli terrorism expert, and then gets them on board a program that puts guns into the hands of “certain gifted” four-year-olds). This dynamic pretty much rules out a defamation lawsuit, but other possible avenues are also long shots for a variety of reasons, according to this account, including anti-SLAPP laws and, above all, the fact that in almost every case Cohen’s subjects have signed a release.