Case 0:17-cv-60426-UU Document 169 Entered on FLSD Docket 06/04/2018 Page 21 of 22 Edwards described the neutral report privilege as a constitutional privilege under the First Amendment. 556 F.2d at 120. Therefore, notwithstanding the New York courts’ rejection of the neutral report privilege, the Court must decide whether it agrees with and will follow Edwards as a constitutional matter. For the reasons discussed below, the Court declines to follow Edwards. First, the Supreme Court has not considered Edwards or the neutral report privilege. Neither has the Eleventh Circuit. Of the other Circuit Courts, only the Eighth has followed Edwards. See Price v. Viking Penguin, Inc., 881 F.2d 1426, 1434 (8th Cir. 1989). The Third has rejected Edwards outright. See Dickey v. CBS Inc., 583 F.2d 1221, 1226 (3d Cir.1978). The Fourth, Seventh, Ninth, and Tenth Circuits have considered the privilege, but have not adopted it. See Lee v. Dong-A-Ilbo, 849 F.2d 876, 878 (4th Cir.1988); Woods v. Evansville Press Co., Inc., 791 F.2d 480, 489 (7th Cir.1986); Weaver v. Oregonian Pub. Co., 878 F.2d 388 (9th Cir. 1989); Dixson v. Newsweek, Inc., 562 F.2d 626, 631 (10th Cir.1977). Second, the Court agrees with Edwards’s critics. Edwards stands for the proposition that the press is free to publish defamatory statements provided the statements are newsworthy and originate from a source which is—in some amorphous sense—“trustworthy.” This cannot be reconciled with Gertz and St. Amant v. Thompson, 390 U.S. 727 (1968), which make liability for defamation dependent upon the public or private status of the plaintiff, and the defendant’s knowledge as to the falsity of the statement. Under Edwards, these considerations become irrelevant when the subject of the statement is newsworthy and provided to the press by a reliable source. See Dickey, 583 F.2d 1226 n.5 (3d Cir. 1978) (“it appears that what triggers the existence of the constitutional privilege of neutral reportage, according to Edwards, is not whether the plaintiff is a public or private figure, but whether the statement published by the defendant is “newsworthy.” . . . [in Gertz] the Court held that the application of the Sullivan 21