Email from The Institute for Free Speech The Latest News from the Institute for Free Speech March 17, 2025 Click here to subscribe to the Daily Media Update. This is the Daily Media Update published by the Institute for Free Speech. For press inquiries, please contact [email protected]. In the News Idaho Capital Sun: Legislative Notebook: Idaho governor signs firing squad, grocery tax credit, and anti-SLAPP bills By Christina Lords .....Sponsored by Sen. Brian Lenney, R-Nampa, and signed into law by Little on Monday, House Bill 1001 aims to protect free speech and curtail frivolous lawsuits. The law is designed to combat strategic lawsuits against public participation, or SLAPP lawsuits. The law would allow lawsuits to be put on hold if a party files an anti-SLAPP motion. The motion would freeze the case and allow a judge to quickly dismiss any lawsuit deemed to be frivolous. The law, which will take effect on Jan. 1, would let the winning party recover attorney fees. Anti-SLAPP laws are in place in 35 [now 36] states and the District of Columbia, according to a 2023 report by the Institute for Free Speech. Bangor Daily News: Laurel Libby’s lawsuit is unprecedented test of Maine legislative rules By Billy Kobin .....Libby’s resulting federal lawsuit against House Speaker Ryan Fecteau, D-Biddeford, over him invoking a rule barring Libby from speaking and voting in the chamber is unprecedented in Maine and potentially in any state, various legal experts and free speech advocates said… “I think it’s safe to say this is pretty unusual,” David Keating, president of the Institute for Free Speech, a conservative nonprofit based in Washington, D.C., said Friday. Politico (Politico Influence): Proposed FARA tweaks get shredded By Caitlin Oprysko .....In the same vein, commenters railed against DOJ for declining as part of the rulemaking to formally define key terms in the statute — like what would make someone an “agent” of a foreign principal. The department argued in its rulemaking that it wanted to preserve flexibility in the statute, leaving the determination up to the highly fact-specific advisory opinion process. Ed. note:In addition to joining the above-referenced comments, the Institute for Free Speech also filed its own comments, available here. The Courts Reason (Volokh Conspiracy): Anti-DEI Executive Orders Can Go Forward, for Now, Says Federal Appeals Court By Eugene Volokh .....From yesterday's decision in Nat'l Ass'n of Diversity Officers in Higher Ed. v. Trump, by Chief Judge Albert Diaz, with Judges Pamela Harris and Allison Rushing concurring: Trump Administration National Review: Trump’s Executive Order Targeting Perkins Coie Must Be Condemned By Andrew C. McCarthy ....I’d prefer to ignore the EO because the Democrats and their base supporters now expressing outrage over it are hypocrites... Democrats and their Trump-deranged allies in the legal profession did precisely this sort of thing to John Eastman and other Trump lawyers involved in the “stop the steal” soft coup attempt to retain Trump in power after he lost the 2020 presidential election… Judge Howell reportedly suggests that the executive order amounts to viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment (among other things). I believe it is a bill of attainder. However you look at it through the Constitution’s prism, it cannot stand. Republicans are evidently too cowed by the president and his base to make a peep about all this. They are currently in control of Congress. They won’t be in control of it for long if they can’t bring themselves to condemn unabashed abuses of executive power. The Weekly Dish: The Return Of The McCarthyite Chill By Andrew Sullivan .....It’s important to note that this is not about protection from woke professors or ideologically captured deans. It’s protection from direct surveillance by the federal government. The Trump administration has launched a massive, all-of-government, AI-assisted program called “Catch and Revoke,” which will scan every social media comment and anything online they can use to flush out any noncitizen who might be seen as anti-Semitic or anti-Zionist or anti-Israel or indeed just getting on Marco Rubio’s wrong side. The Eternally Radical Idea: Five things to remember as the Mahmoud Khalil case develops By Greg Lukianoff and Robert Shibley .....The Khalil story is still developing, and complicated. Importantly, the government has not alleged that Khalil was engaged in any criminal activity. But the arrest follows contentious campus protests that included violations of Columbia campus rules as well as straight-up illegal behavior. This includes the student takeover of Columbia’s Hamilton Hall last year, as well as the recent forced entry into Barnard College, which ended with the hospitalization of a school employee. To what extent, if any, Khalil was involved in misconduct is unclear. New York Times: Don’t Fool Yourself Into Thinking It Will Stop With Columbia By David French .....What was the reason for his arrest, potential deportation and isolation from his own attorneys? According to the Department of Homeland Security’s Notice to Appear that was provided to Khalil, “The secretary of state has determined that your presence or activities in the United States would have serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.” While that statement sounds damning, the reality is that Khalil was detained because of his protest activity and not because he’d provided illegal support for terrorists. As an administration official told The Free Press, “The allegation here is not that he was breaking the law.” Daily Wire: Rubio Rips Censorship Advocates For Saying Pro-Terrorist Foreigners Have First Amendment Rights .....Secretary of State Marco Rubio called out those who are supporting pro-Hamas activist Mahmoud Khalil on First Amendment grounds while many of them have advocated for censorship online in the past. Rubio made the remarks during a Sunday interview on CBS News’ “Face The Nation” with Margaret Brennan when asked about the matter after Khalil was arrested by federal immigration authorities two weeks ago. “I find it ironic that a lot of these people out there defending the First Amendment speech, alleged free speech rights of these Hamas sympathizers they had no problem, okay, pressuring social media to censor American political speech,” he said. “So I think it’s ironic and hypocritical.” “But the bottom line is this, if you are in this country to promote Hamas, to promote terrorist organizations, to participate in vandalism, to participate in acts of rebellion and riots on campus, we never would have let you in if we had known that,” he continued. “And now that we know it, you’re going to leave.” He pushed back on those trying to block the administration from making the country safer by removing dangerous individuals from the country. Wall Street Journal: Top IRS Lawyer Set to Be Demoted Amid Taxpayer Data-Sharing Clash By Richard Rubin and Brian Schwartz .....The Trump administration is demoting the IRS’s top lawyer, according to people familiar with the decision, and the move could make it easier for the tax agency to share its trove of confidential taxpayer data with others in the government. Free Expression New York Times: University of Minnesota, Under Federal Scrutiny, Limits Its Political Speech By Alan Blinder .....The University of Minnesota, which President Trump’s Justice Department is scrutinizing for its handling of antisemitism on campus, largely barred itself on Friday from issuing official statements about “matters of public concern or public interest.” The policy, in the works for months, was not a direct response to the Trump administration’s February announcement that it would investigate whether Minnesota and nine other universities had failed to protect Jewish students and faculty from discrimination. But Friday’s vote by the board of regents nevertheless fit into the scramble by universities to undercut accusations that they have supported, or downplayed, antisemitic behavior or political activity. The States People United for Privacy: PUFPF Comments in Opposition to Maine L.D. 951 .....On behalf of People United for Privacy Foundation (PUFPF), I write in strong opposition to L.D. 951 (S.P. 406), “An Act to Require Disclosure of Campaign Funding Sources,” which is scheduled for a hearing before your Joint Veterans and Legal Affairs Committee on March 17, 2025. The proposal – modeled after Arizona’s Proposition 211 statute, as one sponsor confirms – poses substantial constitutional issues, faces several ongoing legal challenges in that state, and would significantly burden the free speech and privacy rights of Mainers and the vital nonprofit causes they support. It’s especially risky for Maine to pursue this measure, given the certainty of costly and complex litigation that would follow. PDF KUNM: Campaign finance reform is 'dead,' says sponsor By Marjorie Childress .....A bill meant primarily to close loopholes in New Mexico’s law governing the reporting of campaign contributions and expenditures crashed and burned in the House Government, Elections & Indian Affairs committee on Friday. “The bill is dead,” Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe, said late Friday afternoon. Wirth has sought to close loopholes in New Mexico’s Campaign Reporting Act since several groups exploited them in a partially successful attempt to evade disclosing their donors and spending in the 2020 election. Senate Bill 85 sailed through the Senate, then lingered for a month before House committees started just this past week hearing bills passed by the Senate. It faced two committee hearings, a House floor vote, and possibly another Senate vote to concur with any changes the House made, to land on Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s desk. Reason (Volokh Conspiracy): Ban on Public Employee Union Payroll Deductions, with Exception for Certain Unions, Violates Kentucky Constitution By Eugene Volokh .....From Commonwealth v. Kentucky Educ. Ass'n, decided Mar. 7 by the Kentucky Court of Appeals (Judge Susanne Cetrulo, joined by Judges Sara Walter Combs and Kelly Mark Easton): West Virginia Watch: WV House Republicans join Dems 54-41 to reject bill allowing direct corporate political donations By Caity Coyne .....The West Virginia House of Delegates on Thursday rejected a bill that would have allowed businesses and corporations in the state to directly donate up to $2,800 — and potentially more, according to statements — to political candidates. With five members absent and not voting, the body voted 54-41 against House Bill 2719. It was the first time this session that a majority of Republicans in the House sided with Democrats against legislation and the first bill in either chamber this year to be denied through a floor vote. HB 2719 would have removed language in state code that barred corporations, “membership organizations” and businesses from donating directly to political candidates. The proposed code would have allowed any business incorporated by the West Virginia Secretary of State’s Office to give up to $2,800 to a candidate per an election cycle. There were no limits included in the proposed code on how many businesses owned by one person would have been able to donate politically. Through the legislation, business owners could have given the maximum amount of money to candidates multiple times by donating through their businesses, individual giving and political action committees. Read an article you think we would be interested in? Send it to Tiffany Donnelly at [email protected]. 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