Sarah Palin’s defamation suit against The New York Times will resume Thursday in a Manhattan federal court after it was delayed a week and a half because Palin tested positive for the coronavirus.

Heading into the courthouse Thursday morning, Palin told a group of reporters outside: ‘I’m clear to go and never had any symptoms.’

She is expected to be present in the courtroom today for jury selection and opening arguments — despite being unvaccinated, according to Judge Jed S Rakoff.

The former Alaska governor made headlines last week when she disregarded New York City’s requirement that all people dining indoors be vaccinated. Palin was spotted dining indoors at a swanky Upper East Side restaurant the day before her trial’s original start date, which was pushed back due to her positive Covid-19 diagnosis. She was sighted dining out at that same restaurant once again following her positive test results.

Palin sued the newspaper in 2017, claiming the Times defamed her in an editorial headlined America’s Lethal Politics about mass shootings in the US. The article incorrectly tied her political rhetoric to the 2011 mass shooting near Tucson, Arizona, that left Democratic Congress member Gabrielle Giffords severely wounded.

Two days later, the Times issued a correction to the editorial, and said the piece ‘incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting.’

The debated portion of the editorial had been added by James Bennet, who was then the Times’ editorial page editor. The jury will be left to decide whether Bennet acted with ‘actual malice,’ knowing what he wrote was incorrect. Or if he acted with ‘reckless disregard’ for the truth.

Bennet has said he believed the editorial was accurate at the time it was published.

Palin is seeking unspecified damages based on claims that the editorial hurt her career as a political commentator.

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