North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein appealed to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, which granted an injunction pending appeal. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

By Josh Gerstein

02/08/2023 10:52 AM EST

A federal appeals court has sided with North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein in his bid to avoid prosecution under a state law criminalizing false and “derogatory” statements related to political candidates.

In a ruling Wednesday, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals did not outright prohibit a North Carolina district attorney from going forward with a highly unusual prosecution of Stein over his claims related to a rival’s handling of rape test kits. But the appeals court’s decision makes it highly likely that a lower federal court will preclude such a development.

In a saga that has roiled North Carolina’s Democratic Party, Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman signaled plans last year to invoke a rarely used criminal libel statute to indict Stein over his assertion in a 2020 campaign ad that a rival for the attorney general job, Forsyth County District Attorney Jim O’Neill, left 1,500 rape kits untested during his tenure. The spat began with O’Neill claiming on Twitter that Stein left 15,000 rape tests unanalyzed in a state lab, a claim Stein said was false.

Freeman, O’Neill and Stein are all Democrats.

At Stein’s request, U.S. District Court Judge Catherine Eagles briefly blocked any prosecution, but she later withdrew the temporary order and allowed the...

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