The Florida Supreme Court has rejected a bid by former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn to resuscitate his $50 million defamation lawsuit against Rick Wilson, the co-founder of the advocacy group the Lincoln Project.

The high court denied a petition by Flynn, a retired lieutenant general and former Trump administration official, on April 2, adding that it would not entertain a motion for rehearing of the case. The decision leaves in place a December ruling from the Second District Court of Appeal that classified Wilson’s references to Flynn as an employee of Russian President Vladimir Putin and a figure in the QAnon conspiracy theory as either opinion or rhetorical hyperbole, which are protected by the First Amendment.

Flynn’s attorneys had argued that the appeals court misapplied Florida’s anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) statutes, alleging that various Florida appellate courts have different interpretations of the laws and that the state Supreme Court should have determined if the Second District applied the law correctly.