BOISE, ID – After an Idaho judge dismissed a whistleblower lawsuit against the Idaho Attorney General’s Office, the fired attorney appealed to the Idaho Supreme Court.
Daphne Huang, who had legally represented the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare as a deputy attorney general, was fired months after Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador took office in 2023.
Idaho Attorney General’s Office asks judge to dismiss fired attorney’s whistleblower lawsuit
In September, Idaho 4th District Judge Jonathan Medema dismissed Huang’s lawsuit, preventing the case from going to a jury trial. In his ruling, the judge wrote “no rational juror could find” that Huang “had proven any of her claims.”
Many of her lawsuit’s claims revolved around Labrador’s investigation into the Department of Health and Welfare’s handling of $72 million in child care grants.
In her appeal to the Idaho Supreme Court filed on Oct. 23, Huang’s attorneys wrote that the ruling “erred by holding that there was no genuine issue as to any material fact” related to her lawsuit’s claim under the state’s whistleblower law, called Idaho’s Protection of Public Employees Act.
Labrador’s spokesperson, Damon Sidur, declined to comment on the appeal. The Attorney General’s Office has argued Huang was fired for misconduct.
Hours before Huang’s firing in March 2023, she expressed ethical concerns about the ethics of the Idaho Attorney General’s Office new management, according to records released in the lawsuit.
Before firing her, Labrador didn’t look into Huang’s concerns, he said in a deposition.
“I had no concerns. It was clear that she was not acting in good faith. And it was clear that she was already preparing for litigation,” Labrador said.
Huang filed her lawsuit in September 2023.
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