August 2, 2024

In the News

Sen. Rand Paul: Dr. Rand Paul, Rep. Hageman and Rep. Bishop Fight to Protect Americans’ First Amendment Rights Again

.....Yesterday, U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, joined by Congresswoman Harriet Hageman (R-WY) and Congressman Dan Bishop (R-NC-08), introduced the Standing to Challenge Government Censorship Act. This bill will prohibit federal employees and contractors from using their positions to direct online platforms to censor First Amendment protected speech, reinforcing our collective commitment to safeguarding the constitutional rights of all American citizens. The Standing to Challenge Government Censorship Act is a streamlined iteration of the Free Speech Protection Act, tailored to address the standing issues highlighted in Murthy v. Missouri…

Additional support:

“Rights that cannot be vindicated in court are not rights at all. By closing the courthouse doors to Americans who are victimized by government censorship campaigns, Murthy invites the government to violate First Amendment rights at will—so long as it does so indirectly, utilizing numerous government agencies, rather than directly or through a single agency. Murthy essentially gives the government a blueprint on how to censor American citizens. This legislation says, ‘not so fast’,” said Bradley A. Smith, Chairman and Founder, Institute for Free Speech.

Supreme Court

First Amendment News: Clement and Murphy ask high court to overrule Hill v. Colorado . . . but will the petition be granted? — First Amendment News 433

By Ronald K.L. Collins

.....Should the Supreme Court overrule Hill v. Colorado?

That is how the issue is presented in the certiorari petition Paul Clement and Erin Murphy filed in Coalition Life v. City of Carbondale.

Think of it as Justice Antonin Scalia’s posthumous revenge. Hill v. Colorado is a case he dissented in nearly a quarter-century ago. And to think that such a reversal could come about by the efforts of Paul Clement, a former law clerk to Scalia from 1993-1994, when Madsen v. Women's Health Center, Inc. was handed down (with Scalia dissenting in part regarding abortion buffer zones). That dissent has become part of Scalia’s constitutional canon (see Jeffrey Sutton and Edward Whelan’s “The Essential Scalia,” pages 94-98, noting that Scalia “strongly object[s] to the Court’s holding.”)

Has Hill v. Colorado already been constitutionally decimated?

CNN: Exclusive: How Samuel Alito got canceled from the Supreme Court social media majority

By Joan Biskupic

.....The hardline approach Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito takes usually gets him what he wants.

This year it backfired.

Behind the scenes, the conservative justice sought to put a thumb on the scale for states trying to restrict how social media companies filter content. His tactics could have led to a major change in how platforms operate.

CNN has learned, however, that Alito went too far for two justices – Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson – who abandoned the precarious 5-4 majority and left Alito on the losing side.

As a result, the final 6-3 ruling led by Justice Elena Kagan backed the First Amendment rights of social media companies

It is rare that a justice tapped to write the majority opinion loses it in ensuing weeks, but sources tell CNN that it happened twice this year to Alito. He also lost the majority as he was writing the decision in the case of a Texas councilwoman who said she was arrested in retaliation for criticizing the city manager.

The Courts

FEC: District Court issues opinion and order in Free Speech for People, et al. v. FEC

.....The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a Memorandum Opinion and Order in Free Speech for People, et al. v. FEC (Case No. 22-666) today, granting the Commission’s Motion to Dismiss and dismissing Plaintiffs’ Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief in its entirety.

In 2022, Plaintiffs filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia alleging that the FEC’s dismissal of the plaintiffs’ administrative complaint in MUR 7207 was contrary to law. The court held that the Commission’s dismissal of the complaint was a proper exercise of the agency’s prosecutorial discretion.

PETA: Federal Court Says National Institutes of Health Censored Critics on Social Media in Violation of First Amendment

.....The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit today ruled that the National Institutes of Health (NIH)’s use of keyword blocking, which targets comments critical of animal testing, violates the First Amendment. Its decision comes in response to a lawsuit brought by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and the Animal Legal Defense Fund. 

Nola.com: Louisiana media outlets sue over police buffer law, citing First Amendment violation

By Alyse Pfeil

.....Six news organizations have filed a federal lawsuit over a new Louisiana law that makes it a crime to be within 25 feet of an on-duty police officer if ordered to stay away.

Act 259, which takes effect Aug. 1, "has grave implications for the ability of reporters and news organizations ... to exercise their First Amendment rights," the complaint reads. 

The federal lawsuit, which asks the court to block enforcement of the act and to declare it unconstitutional, was filed July 31 in the U.S. Middle District Court of Louisiana. Verite News, Gannett, Gray, Nexstar, Scripps and Tegna are listed as plaintiffs.

Cincinnati Enquirer: Appeals court throws out $600K awarded in lawsuit related to Tracie Hunter case

By Kevin Grasha

.....A federal appeals court has ruled that a woman and her attorneys should not have been awarded nearly $600,000 in a lawsuit connected to her actions a decade ago during the Tracie Hunter case.

In an opinion filed Wednesday, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a jury award of $35,000, as well as $546,000 in attorney's fees awarded by the federal judge who oversaw the trial.

Free Expression

FIRE: Poll: Majority of Americans believe First Amendment goes TOO FAR in the rights it guarantees

.....Fifty-three percent of Americans believe that the First Amendment goes too far in the rights it protects, according to a new poll by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression.

“Evidently, one out of every two Americans wishes they had fewer civil liberties,” said FIRE Chief Research Advisor Sean Stevens. “Many of them reject the right to assemble, to have a free press, and to petition the government. This is a dictator’s fantasy.”

Americans are crying out for censorship. Around 40% trust the government “somewhat,” “very much,” or “completely” to make fair decisions about what speech is considered terrifying, intimidating, threatening, harassing, annoying, disturbing, and indecent. Another quarter trust the government “a little.” And only 32% of Americans said they would be “not at all” comfortable with the government limiting the free speech of pro-Hamas protesters.

Candidates and Campaigns

Washington Post: $10M cash withdrawal drove secret probe into whether Trump took money from Egypt

By Aaron C. Davis and Carol D. Leonnig

.....Inside the state-run National Bank of Egypt, employees were soon busy placing bundles of $100 bills into two large bags, according to records from the bank. Four men arrived and carried away the bags, which U.S. officials later described in sealed court filings as weighing a combined 200 pounds and containing what was then a sizable share of Egypt’s reserve of U.S. currency.

Federal investigators learned of the withdrawal, which has not been previously reported, early in 2019. The discovery intensified a secret criminal investigation that had begun two years earlier with classified U.S. intelligence indicating that Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sisi sought to give Trump $10 million to boost his 2016 presidential campaign, a Washington Post investigation has found.

Since receiving the intelligence about Sisi, the Justice Department had been examining whether money moved from Cairo to Trump, potentially violating federal law that bans U.S. candidates from taking foreign funds.

Online Speech Platforms

NBC News: Elon Musk made a Kamala Harris deepfake ad go viral, sparking a debate about parody and free speech

By Kat Tenbarge

.....A fake Kamala Harris campaign ad using a manipulated version of her voice has become a flash point in the escalating debate over how to treat manipulated media — often referred to as deepfakes — ahead of the 2024 election.

The fake Harris audio, recirculated by Elon Musk in a post that has been seen more than 150 million times, includes digs about diversity, President Joe Biden and border policies, as well as edited clips from real Harris appearances. 

But reactions to the deepfake of Harris have been divided, with some saying it’s an example of a dangerous type of manipulated media that needs tight regulation, and others saying it’s a clear example of parody and thus deserves a different type of treatment. 

Washington Post: X suspends ‘White Dudes for Harris’ account after massive fundraiser

By Trisha Thadani, Will Oremus and Eva Dou

.....Elon Musk’s social media platform X suspended “White Dudes for Harris” Monday night, shortly after a massive fundraising call where almost 200,000 people helped raise more than $4 million for the vice president and presumptive Democratic nominee.

The account, @dudes4harris, was reinstated Tuesday morning after it was blocked hours before because of “a user report” for “violating our rules against evading suspension,” according to a screenshot shared with The Washington Post. Organizer Ross Morales Rocketto said the group submitted a complaint to X, but had no other direct communication from the platform.

The States

New York Times: Secret Bundlers, Sham Donations: Adams Is Faulted in Campaign Audit

By Bianca Pallaro and Jay Root

.....There were also 158 fund-raising events with undisclosed sponsors, including one linked in court filings to Shahid Mushtaq, the principal of a construction company in Queens who, along with three associates, pleaded guilty for their role in a straw donor scheme to generate illicit matching funds to Adams’s mayoral campaign.

The questionable donations were cited in a blistering 900-page preliminary audit of Mr. Adams’s 2021 mayoral campaign, as investigators with the Campaign Finance Board chronicled numerous missing payments, sham donations and the potential misallocation of up to $2.3 million in taxpayer money.

The audit, which The New York Times obtained via a Freedom of Information request, is still in draft form, meaning Mr. Adams will get the opportunity to respond and potentially resolve some or all of the board’s red flags.