In direct response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision striking down the constitutionality of section 2(a) of the Lanham Act, which as enacted barred the registration of disparaging trademarks, there is reason to believe that offensive trademark registration applications are on the rise.

According to Reuters, there were at least nine new applications filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”) between the June 19, 2017 Supreme Court ruling and the end of July 2017.  Such marks include versions of the N-word, a swastika symbol, and other offensive terms/phrases.  For example, Snowflake Enterprises LLC has filed multiple trademark applications for offensive marks, examples of which can be found on the PTO’s website (a version of the N-word can be seen here and a swastika symbol can be seen here). Prior to the Supreme Court’s ruling, it’s likely that the PTO would have outright rejected such filings as they had with similar filings in the past.  But the PTO is now under new guidance—that trademark applicants are protected by the free speech rights guaranteed under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.  According to Reuters, the PTO told its staff a few days after the June 19 Supreme Court ruling that they could no longer use section 2(a) of the Lanham Act to reject a trademark application for a disparaging trademark.

The full effect of the June 19, 2017 Supreme Court ruling remains to be seen, but the evidence to date suggests that applications for offensive trademarks will increase and that the PTO will be forced to approve them if the marks otherwise qualify for trademark registration.  However, if the applicant does not establish actual use of the offensive mark or does not use the offensive mark as a source identifier, the PTO can still reject the application.  Thus, with the exception of the once-applied disparaging trademark ban, the PTO will continue to apply the same standards to trademark applications as it has in the past.

Prior Above the Fold blog posts explaining the Supreme Court’s June 19, 2017 ruling in more detail can be found here and here.

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