August 7, 2024

The Courts

New York Times: X, Owned by Elon Musk, Brings Antitrust Suit Accusing Advertisers of a Boycott

By Kate Conger

.....X filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, a coalition of major advertisers, claiming that it had violated antitrust laws by coordinating with brands to dissuade them from spending money on the social media platform.

Ed. note: Watch X CEO Linda Yaccarino's video message to X users about the lawsuit here and the open letter to advertisers here.

Wall Street Journal: Judge Denies Harvard’s Request to Drop Lawsuit Over Antisemitism on Campus

By Joseph Pisani

.....A lawsuit against Harvard University, alleging that the school didn’t do enough to protect Jewish students from antisemitism, will go on after a judge ruled against Harvard’s attempt to stop it. 

U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns said in his decision to deny Harvard’s motion to dismiss Tuesday that “Harvard failed its Jewish students,” based on the evidence.

The lawsuit, which was filed in January by six Jewish students in Massachusetts federal court, said that the students didn’t feel safe on campus and alleges the school didn’t punish antisemitic student protesters and faculty members...

Harvard had asked to dismiss the lawsuit in April, arguing in part that breaking up protests would have infringed on the First Amendment rights of students. Judge Stearns said the court “is dubious that Harvard can hide behind the First Amendment.”

Reuters: New Jersey defends privacy law shielding judges, prosecutors

By Nate Raymond

.....New Jersey's attorney general is urging a federal judge to reject a bid by scores of businesses to have a new law barring the disclosure of home addresses and other personal information belonging to judges and prosecutors declared unconstitutional.

New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin's office in a Monday brief, argued the disclosure restrictions served to protect public safety and did not run afoul of the companies' free speech rights under the U.S. Constitution's 1st Amendment.

Wall Street Journal: Biden’s Unconstitutional Sanctions on Supporters of Israel

By Eugene Kontorovich

.....The Biden administration has been easing sanctions on Iran over the past year. Meanwhile it is using a recent executive order to impose unprecedented sanctions on Jews in Israel who disagree with the administration’s policies. The sanctions violate the constitutional rights of U.S. citizens in Israel and their supporters in America.

This week an American Christian Zionist nonprofit, Texans for Israel, and several American Jews living in Israel filed a lawsuit in federal court in Texas challenging the sanctions regime on free-speech, due-process and equal-protection grounds…

Texans for Israel’s support for Judea and Samaria settlements—by hosting speaking events or donating to Israeli advocacy groups—is an exercise of its First Amendment rights. But because of the breadth of the executive order, which sweeps in vast amounts of perfectly legal conduct, it faces massive financial risks that unconstitutionally chill its free speech.

New Mexico In Depth: Federal judge sends dark money group lawsuit back to state court

By Marjorie Childress

.....A federal judge has rejected a nonprofit group’s bid to move to federal court a campaign finance case brought against it by the state ethics commission. In a July 17 opinion, Chief United States District Judge William P. Johnson for the District of New Mexico said his court lacked jurisdiction over the question of whether or not the New Mexico Project, a nonprofit formed last year, must register as a political committee and disclose its donors.  

“This is a state law case – with exclusively state law causes of action – that belongs in state court,” the judge wrote in an opinion that sent the case back to state court in New Mexico. 

FCC

Washington Examiner: The FCC’s proposed rule on AI in political ads is misguided

By Randolph May

.....The Federal Communications Commission initiated a new rulemaking proceeding last month to require broadcasters, along with cable and satellite TV providers, to disclose the use of any AI-generated content in political advertisements. Probably not coincidently, this new administrative state power grab mirrors a plea submitted to the Federal Election Commission by the Democratic National Committee asking the FEC to regulate AI-generated political speech...

In dissenting from initiating the rulemaking, Republican Commissioner Nathan Simington readily conceded that artificial intelligence is a “buzzy topic,” but warned that “absent the compelling force of an ongoing crisis or a situation worsening moment-to-moment, the worst time to regulate a domain is when everyone is talking about it.” 

His fellow Republican Brendan Carr declared in dissent: “Far from promoting transparency, the FCC’s proposed rules would mire voters in confusion, create a patchwork of inconsistent rules, and encourage monied, partisan interests to weaponize the law for electoral advantage.”

Candidates and Campaigns

New York Post: Kamala Harris’ First Amendment threats as Cali AG reveal her ruthless politics

By Howard Husock

.....In 2012, AG Harris moved to reinterpret a California statute requiring nonprofit charities to report the names of donors contributing more than $5,000. 

There was no obvious law enforcement reason to do so; such “Schedule B” reports, including all those names, were already required by the IRS, and Harris’ predecessors had deemed that sufficient. If criminal offenses were suspected, Harris as attorney general could have subpoenaed the necessary records. 

But California progressives at the time were obsessed with the influence of “dark money” — at least when it came to conservatives pushing back against the state’s high taxes and expansive government.

They wanted names.

Americans for Prosperity was concerned that revealing donor names to a hostile state agency might result in their becoming public.

They had good reason to worry: Between 2012 and 2021, as Harris and her successors doggedly continued their efforts during subsequent-court action, the state “inadvertently” posted more than 1,700 Schedule B forms on a public website.

Candidates and Campaigns

New York Times: F.B.I. Seizes Republican Lawmaker’s Phone Amid Scrutiny Over Loan

By Luke Broadwater

.....The F.B.I. has seized the phone of Representative Andy Ogles, Republican of Tennessee, as it carries out an apparent investigation into his campaign finances.

The bureau served a search warrant at Mr. Ogles’s home in central Tennessee on Friday and took his phone, according to his lawyer, G. Kline Preston IV.

“There was a search warrant for a phone,” Mr. Preston said. “That was it. It was a limited search, and we cooperated with the F.B.I.”...

Mr. Ogles has been under scrutiny after reporting a $320,000 loan to his campaign in April 2022. That prompted questions about whether Mr. Ogles, who also reported limited financial resources on his House financial disclosure forms, could have afforded to lend that amount. In May, Mr. Ogles, who called the reported loan a mistake, amended his campaign finance reports to remove it.

The Campaign Legal Center, a watchdog group, filed a complaint against Mr. Ogles in January, seeking an ethics investigation into whether the congressman violated financial disclosure requirements.

The States

AP News: Suburban New York county bans wearing of masks to hide identity

.....Lawmakers in a suburban New York county have approved a bill to ban masks in public places with exemptions for people who cover their faces for health reasons or religious or cultural purposes.

Supporters said the bill approved Monday by the Republican-controlled Nassau County Legislature on Long Island would prevent violent protesters from hiding their identity.

Jersey City Times: Fulop Fires Aide Who Donated to Sister’s Anti-LGBTQ+ Campaign for Missouri Secretary of State

By Aaron Morrill

.....Capping a day of fast moving events, Mayor Steven Fulop has fired an aide who donated to his sister’s anti-LGBTQ campaign for Missouri Secretary of State.

In a tweet on X tonight directed at the sister, Valentina Gomez, Fulop said “as of tomorrow he no longer works there bc he doesn’t reflect the values of the city.”

The contributions to Valentina Gomez’s campaign by her brother, Jonathan Gomez, an aide to Fulop, were first reported by The Jersey City Times on Friday.

Fulop’s tweet tonight appears to have been a response to Valentina Gomez who, in her own earlier tweet, threatened the mayor with a “Huge lawsuit incoming” for his treatment of her brother. In a video, she plays back a portion of a recorded phone call between the mayor and Jonathan in which the mayor appears to demand a clear disavowal of Valentina Gomez’s views. “Jon, if you think that is boldness, I’m going to fire you. I’m gonna look in five minutes. If it’s not clear where you stand, then you’re not with me, you’re with her and you can’t work with me, period.”

Bangor Daily News: This obscure Bangor law likely violates the First Amendment

By Kathleen O'Brien

.....Bangor may ask voters to approve changing an obscure city rule that likely violates their First Amendment rights.

The proposed change would alter Article VI, Section 3 of Bangor’s city charter, which limits how many candidate petitions residents can sign to the number of candidates that can be elected to office. A city charter is a document that lists local laws for a certain community.

For example, three city council seats are up for grabs this November. This means a resident can only sign up to three petitions for candidates looking to get on the city council ballot, even if more than three people are collecting signatures, according to David Szewczyk, Bangor’s city solicitor.

This can be especially limiting when several people are interested in running for a city council or school committee but only a few positions are open, as candidates must collect at least 100 resident signatures to get their name on the ballot.