Opinion

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS

AMARILLO DIVISION

OPEN CHEER & DANCE

CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES LLC, et al.,

Plaintiffs,

v. 2:23-CV-155-Z

VARSITY SPIRIT, LLC, et al.,

Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Before the Court is Defendants’ Motion for Leave as to the Court’s Orders Regarding

Exhibit Sealing and to Hold the May 29, 2026 Deadline in Abeyance Pending Further

Developments in the Case (“Motion”), filed May 28, 2026. ECF No. 322. Plaintiffs responded

the same day. ECF No. 323. Defendants replied later that evening. ECF No. 324.

BACKGROUND

On May 8, 2026, the Court ordered the parties to publicly file thousands of pages of

documents that Defendants had sought to maintain under seal no later than today, May 29

(the “Sealing Orders”). ECF No. 290. The Court deferred ruling on one of Defendants’ motions

to file under seal but later denied it in part, ordering Defendants to file redacted versions of

the documents at issue by the same date. ECF No. 305.

On May 22, the parties filed a Joint Status Report Regarding Mediation, stating that

they “attended an in-person mediation” the week prior and “anticipate[d] finalizing a

settlement agreement soon.” ECF No. 317 at 1--2. This settlement was between Plaintiffs and

Defendant Varsity only and did “not include Plaintiffs releasing any claims against

Defendant USASF.” Jd. at 2. On May 26, Plaintiffs filed another status report, which stated

that they had “reached a confidential settlement agreement with respect to Plaintiffs’ claims

against only Defendant Varsity” and that “[t]he terms of the agreement have been reduced

to writing in the form of a Confidential Settlement Agreement.” ECF No. 319 at 1. Plaintiffs

said the settlement “contemplate[d] the dismissal of Defendant Varsity upon its fulfillment

of certain terms under the Settlement Agreement within 7 days,” after which time they would

file a stipulation of dismissal. Jd. The Court accordingly ordered Plaintiffs and Varsity to file

such a stipulation on their proposed timeline, ordered Plaintiffs to mediate their remaining

claims against USASF, denied the parties’ summary judgment motions as moot, and vacated

all pending deadlines not related to the Sealing Orders. ECF No. 321 at 2. Regrettably, the

Court also invited the parties to “move for leave and explain” whether “their partial

settlement affects the upcoming May 29 sealing deadlines.” Jd. n.1. An onslaught of briefs

followed.

ANALYSIS

Defendants “submit that the partial settlement and the Court’s denial of the pending

summary judgment motions as moot warrants holding in abeyance the May 29, 2026 deadline

to file the materials that were submitted under seal with the parties’ summary judgment

motions.” Id. at 2. As Defendants note, the Court did not rule on those motions on the merits,

“but instead denied them as moot and administratively closed the case, pending court-

ordered mediation with an eye toward resolution of the remaining claims against Defendant

USASF.” Id.

Defendants argue this warrants “holding the May 29 deadline in abeyance for now as

it pertains to the summary judgment materials” because the documents filed in connection

with those motions were not relied upon in the “exercise of judicial authority.” Jd. at 3 (citing

Binh Hoa Le v. Exeter Fin. Corp., 990 F.3d 410, 418 (2021)). They do not dispute that the

filing deadline for materials related to the motions the Court has ruled on, including

Defendants’ Daubert motions, still “remain in effect.” Jd. at 3 n.1. Plaintiffs counter that

“foJnce a document is filed on the public record it becomes a ‘judicial record” to which the

public's right of access attaches. ECF No. 323 at 1 (quoting Vantage Health Plan, Inc. v.

Willis-Knighton Med. Ctr., 913 F.3d 443, 451 (5th Cir. 2019)). They aver that the Court has

already “considered each document, page by page” under Binh Hoa Le and argue that holding

today’s sealing deadline in abeyance would amount to “reconsider[ation]” of the Court’s

Sealing Orders “under a less strict standard.” Jd. at 1-2.

Under Binh Hoa Le, “{j]udicial records are public records,” and “public records, by

definition, presume public access.” 990 F.3d at 416. The “working presumption is that judicial

records should not be sealed,” and parties who wish to file documents under seal must satisfy

“a stricter balancing test” that “applies ‘[ojnce a document is filed on the public record.” Jd.

at 419 (quoting Vantage, 913 F.3d at 451). The Court takes the public’s right of access to

judicial proceedings very seriously. This is why the Court, in its May 8 and May 18 Sealing

Orders, ordered the public filing of thousands of pages of documents Defendants sought to

maintain under seal, allowing only limited redactions. ECF Nos. 290, 305.

But a question remains: What is a “judicial record”? Is a judicial record anything filed

on the public docket, as Plaintiffs contend? Or, as Defendants argue, is a judicial record only

those documents actually relied upon by a court “in the exercise of judicial authority”—1.e.,

in the adjudication of the rights of parties on the merits?

The answer is somewhere in between. Binh Hoa Le itself doesn’t define “judicial

records.” But it strongly implies that a “judicial record” is any document filed with a court in

connection with motions that ask the court to exercise its adjudicative authority. See 990

F.3d at 420 n.41 (noting that the lower “good-cause standard would not justify sealing

documents filed on the record in support of summary judgment” (citing Vantage, 913 F.3d at

451 (emphasis added))). The act of filing a document on the public docket creates a

presumption in favor of public access to that document, which “can be rebutted only by

compelling countervailing interests favoring nondisclosure.” Id. at 421. Binh Hoa Le and the

follow-on case of June Medical Services, L.L.C. v. Phillips support this view: Both say the

public access right attaches “at the adjudicative stage,” which they describe as beginning

“when materials enter the court record.” 22 F.4th 512, 521 (5th Cir. 2022) (quoting Binh Hoa

Le, 990 F.3d at 420).

Nowhere do Binh Hoa Le or its progeny distinguish between documents related to

motions the court eventually rules on on the merits and those the court does not. As Plaintiffs

note, district courts in the Fifth Circuit routinely rule on motions to file documents under

seal before issuing merits rulings on the underlying motions—just as the Court did here. See,

e.g., Carter v. Sw. Atrlines Co., No, 3:17-CV-2278, 2022 WL 283025 (N.D. Tex. Jan. 31, 2022)

(ruling on three motions for leave to file documents under seal without addressing the

underlying summary judgment motions). But under Defendants’ proposed rule, the public’s

right of access would attach only after the underlying motion has been adjudicated on the

merits. Nothing in Binh Hoa Le supports that reading, and widespread district court practice

undermines it.

In fact, Binh Hoa Le implicitly rejects Defendants’ position. Judge Willett repeatedly

distinguishes between the lower standard for “sealing documents produced in discovery” and

the “stricter” standard that applies “[o]nce a document is filed on the public record.” Binh

Hoa Le, 990 F.3d at 419. The public’s right of access does not apply at all to the first category

of documents, which require only “good cause” to maintain under seal. Jd. at 418-19. But it

applies with full force the moment a document is filed on the public docket. See id. at 419

n.31 (“One explanation of the different sealing standards for discovery and judicial records is

that ‘material filed with discovery motions is not subject to the common-law right of access,

whereas discovery material filed in connection with pretrial motions that require judicial

resolution of the merits is subject to the common-law right.” (quoting Chi. Tribune Co. v.

Bridgestone/ Firestone, Inc., 263 F.3d 1804, 1812 (11th Cir. 2001))). And Binh Hoa Le

reiterates that filings related to dispositive motions, like the summary judgment motions at

issue here, are always subject to the strictest sealing requirements. See id. (noting that

“dispositive filings” are “generally subject to a more stringent sealing standard than

discovery documents” (citing Seth Katsuya Endo, Contracting for Confidential Discovery, 53

U.C. DAVIS L. REV. 1249, 1283 (2020))); see also id. at 420 n.41 (“[M]aterials used by a court

in granting summary judgment, a dispositive motion that adjudicates the legal merits of a

case and that essentially substitutes for trial, present the clearest example of judicial records

presumptively subject to public scrutiny.” (quoting Laurie Kratky Dore, Secrecy by Consent:

The Use and Limits of Confidentiality in the Pursuit of Settlement, 74 NOTRE DAME L. REV.

283, 375 (1999))). The mere fact that the Court has not ruled on the parties’ summary

judgment motions does not mean that Defendants are relieved of their obligations under the

Sealing Orders.

Nor does the fact that the Court denied the summary judgment motions as moot

pending mediation! mean that the public’s right of access has been erased. Undoubtedly the

presumption in favor of public access is weaker here than if the Court had used these

materials to issue a ruling on the merits, as the Court did with Defendants’ Daubert motions.

ECF No. 320. But it has not vanished altogether. Here, the parties filed these documents in

connection with their summary judgment motions. The parties requested a ruling on those

motions and asked the Court to rely on the documents in making that ruling. See ECF No.

Uisua Homnats, Biniadiaway Gey “may seek clarification regarding the denial of their motion for

summary judgment as moot and whether they will be granted leave to re-file the motion.” ECF No.

323 at 2. In the unlikely event that mediation proves unsuccessful, the Court will grant both Plaintiffs

and USASF leave to refile any necessary motions.

311 at 2 (asking the Court to vacate two pretrial deadlines because “the parties anticipate[d]

that the Court’s rulings on those motions will materially affect the scope” of their trial

preparation). The documents remain “judicial records” just as much as before the Court

denied the summary judgment motions as moot. So Defendants must file them for the public

to see.

Defendants’ Motion is DENIED. All deadlines from the Court’s Sealing Orders (ECF

Nos. 290, 305) remain in place. Plaintiffs may file “copies of their own filings that no party

seeks to seal, as well as those filings where the Court has declined to redact or seal anything.”

ECF No. 323 at 3. The parties are reminded that “[t]he Court expects strict compliance with”

its orders and violations of the Sealing Orders will expose the violating party to the “full

range of appropriate sanctions.” ECF No. 290 at 41.

SO ORDERED.

May 27 2026 Whfaaccan

MATTHEW J. KACSMARYK

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE