Judge rules against Packers fan for Sunday's Bears game

Green Bay Press Gazette

CHICAGO – Green Bay Packers fan Russell Beckman failed to convince a federal judge that she should order the Chicago Bears to let him wear Packers gear before Sunday's football game between the teams at Soldier Field.

Russell Beckman of Racine wears a pile of beads around his neck in support of his Green Bay Packers. (File/USA TODAY-Network)

U.S. District Judge Joan Gottschall declined Thursday to issue a temporary restraining order requiring the Bears to allow Beckman to wear Packers gear during a Bears season ticket holders' rewards program. He is a Packers fan and a season ticket holder for both teams.

Beckman sued the Bears in June 2017 because the team would not let him wear his Packers garb on the sidelines at Soldier Field, where he participated in a 2016 pregame event as part of the Bears' season ticket holders' rewards program called the Pregame Warm-up Field Credential Experience. In that program, participants are allowed to stand in the northeastern corner of the stadium and along the north end zone during warmups.

Gottschall said Beckman made a modest showing that he could win his case and met the thresholds for claiming irreparable harm, but not enough evidence was presented by either party during a hearing on Wednesday on the restraining order request to tip the likelihood of irreparable harm to the advantage of either.

"The judge today said the parties’ arguments to the court were essentially a tie ball. But a tie ball goes to the home team at this juncture," Beckman's attorney, Michael Lieber, said in an emailed statement. "This case is in its early stages.

"As we proceed through discovery, we expect that the facts will show that the Bears are so entwined with a public entity — the Chicago Park District — that the Bears must uphold all Soldier Field patrons’ First Amendment rights. And that includes fans of opposing teams."

The Bears agreed with the judge's decision, said Brandon Faber, vice president of communications.

"We are aware and agree with Judge Gottschall's ruling denying the plantiff's motion for a Temporary Restraining Order," Faber wrote in an email.

Attorneys for Beckman filed the request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction on Nov. 29 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. They argued the Bears are depriving Beckman of his First Amendment right of freedom of expression.

Beckman argued the requirements of the Bears' operating agreement with the Chicago Park District for Soldier Field make the football team a state actor. In other words, what happens at Soldier Field is a public, not private, activity, as it might be where a team owns its stadium outright.

The Bears counter that the Chicago Park District has no involvement in the rewards program and so it is not subject to state action.

Gottschall said Beckman failed to make the "state actor" connection in oral arguments, but she was not persuaded by all of the Bears' arguments, either.

"What has emerged of the facts and circumstances here diminishes, but does not destroy, Beckman’s chances of proving state action," she said.

Gottschall on Tuesday denied a request by the Bears asking her to reconsider a March 2018 ruling that the case could proceed. The Bears wanted it dismissed.