The maker of the “Bush Lied…They Died” T-shirt was sued by parents of a fallen soldier for $40 billion. But a federal judge just tossed the case out.

Dan Frazier of Flagstaff created the shirt.

“My idea was to show dramatically the toll that the war was taking,” he said. At the time of the original shirt, 1,600 U.S. soldiers had died, and he couldn’t get all of the names on a bumper sticker, so he opted for a T-shirt.

Two years ago, with the help of the ACLU, Frazier prevailed in court against the state of Arizona, which had unanimously passed a law that effectively banned the sale of this shirt.l

Now he’s won again, this time against the family that had sued him for $40 billion and that had demanded that he take the soldiers’ names off his shirt.

“Exercising free speech in criticizing the government is not outrageous,” ruled Judge Ronnie Greer, in dismissing the case on May 5. “The views expressed by the defendants may be unpopular and even offensive to some people, but they do not rise to the level of legal outrageous conduct.”

“Our sympathy goes out to the families of fallen soldiers,” says Tricia Herzfeld, a staff attorney with the ACLU-Tennessee, which argued the case. “But this case goes beyond this particular shirt to the larger issue of chilling protected political speech. We cannot let our emotions jeopardize the free speech rights of Mr. Frazier or others who want to speak out against the war.”

Matthew Rothschild is the editor of The Progressive magazine.