March 25, 2025

New from the Institute for Free Speech

Institute for Free Speech Urges Supreme Court to Revisit Outdated Precedent on Lobbying Disclosure

.....The Institute for Free Speech filed an amicus brief yesterday in Sullivan v. Texas Ethics Commission, urging the Supreme Court of the United States to review the constitutional problems with lobbying registration and disclosure laws.

The Institute’s brief argues that the 1954 precedent of United States v. Harriss no longer reflects modern First Amendment jurisprudence and fails to protect the right to speak anonymously about matters of public policy.

“The premise of Harriss is wrong,” the brief explains. “The government cannot burden the First Amendment right to speak anonymously because disclosure is convenient for elected officials.”

The brief notes that the Supreme Court “has not heard argument in a [lobbying disclosure] case for nearly seventy years,” despite dramatic shifts in First Amendment doctrine that have “undermined the foundation on which Harriss stands.” It argues that this case presents “the perfect opportunity” for the Court to address how modern disclosure requirements burden core political speech.

The brief observes that lobbying disclosure requirements like those in Texas would have treated Alexander Hamilton as “an unregistered lobbyist based on insignificant details like whether James Madison reimbursed him for the cost of printing The Federalist Papers.” The brief contends that “these laws do not prevent any meaningful danger, but they chill the kind of speech that helped give birth to our Nation.”

Supreme Court

The Hill: Supreme Court declines Steve Wynn’s bid to loosen libel standard

By Zach Schonfeld 

.....The Supreme Court on Monday turned away casino mogul Steve Wynn’s bid for the court to consider overturning its 61-year-old precedent that has protected journalists from libel lawsuits. 

Wynn urged the justices to use his lawsuit against The Associated Press to revisit the 1964 landmark decision, New York Times v. Sullivan, which requires a showing of “actual malice” for public figures to hold newspapers and journalists liable for defamation, a high legal bar...

Thomas did not publicly dissent Monday when the high court declined to take up Wynn’s appeal in a brief order.

IJ: Supreme Court Asked to Hear Case Challenging Mississippi’s Ban on Advertising Legal Medical Cannabis

By Dan King

.....On Friday, a Mississippi medical cannabis dispensary owner asked the United States Supreme Court to hear his case challenging the state’s ban on advertising legal medical cannabis businesses. Tru Source Medical Cannabis owner Clarence Cocroft and his attorneys from the Institute for Justice (IJ) filed the petition with the high court after the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the ban last November. 

The Courts

Washington Post: Columbia student protester sues U.S. to prevent deportation

By Frances Vinall

.....A Columbia University student who came to the United States at the age of 7 from South Korea sued the Trump administration on Monday, seeking to avoid deportation. The complaint from Yunseo Chung, 21, alleges that although she is a lawful U.S. permanent resident, the federal government is seeking to remove her from the country because of speech that is protected by the First Amendment.

Reason: Federal Judge Blocks Texas A&M From Banning Drag Shows

By C.J. Ciaramella 

.....A federal judge has blocked the Texas A&M University System from banning drag shows, clearing the way for an upcoming student-run drag performance that administrators had canceled on the grounds that they demeaned women and violated state and federal policies opposing "gender ideology."

Senior U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of Texas Lee Rosenthal issued a preliminary injunction today finding that the Texas A&M Queer Empowerment Council, a student group, was likely to prevail on its claims that the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents violated its First Amendment rights when it banned a March 27 drag show that the group had already reserved space and sold tickets for.

New York Times: Top Trump Campaign Aide Sues The Daily Beast for Defamation

By Katie Robertson and David Enrich

.....One of President Trump’s former campaign managers, Chris LaCivita, on Monday filed a defamation lawsuit against The Daily Beast over its reporting on how much he was paid by the campaign.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, accuses The Daily Beast of creating “the false impression that Mr. LaCivita was personally profiting excessively from his work on the campaign and that he was prioritizing personal gain over the campaign’s success.”

Trump Administration

National Review: Columbia Pays for Its Sins

By The Editors

.....Columbia deserves every bit of what it is now facing at Trump’s indelicate hands. While we enjoy witnessing the comeuppance of institutions rotted by left-wing zealotry and hoisted on the petard of their own intolerance as much as the next fellow, the administration needs to proceed with more care in the future. Otherwise, it risks setting precedents that conservatives will live to regret.

We do not wish to sound like a broken record on the importance of rules, precedents, and a rigorous process in this area. But they do matter, because free speech and the independence of institutions from government dictates are crucially important. We can best fortify their protection by drawing clear and principled distinctions not only when defending political speech we find appalling but also when explaining what falls outside of that line, and why.

Wall Street Journal: Law Firms Scramble to Avoid Being Trump’s Next Target

By Erin Mulvaney, Emily Glazer, Josh Dawsey

.....The White House, on the heels of a successful pressure campaign against law firm Paul Weiss, is escalating its attacks on the legal industry and leaving some firms scrambling to stay out of the crosshairs.

President Trump took a broad swing at the industry Friday night after three earlier orders punishing Paul Weiss and two other firms. In a presidential memorandum, he broadly accused law firms of abusing the legal system to challenge his policies, stymie immigration enforcement and pursue partisan causes. He instructed Attorney General Pam Bondi to seek sanctions in court against lawyers and firms who engage in “frivolous, unreasonable and vexatious litigation.”

Free Expression

New York Times: Immigrants and Freedom of Speech

By German Lopez

.....While conservatives may feel empowered now, their approach could backfire in the future. Suppose that conservative immigrants — say, Trump-supporting Venezuelans, known as MAGAzuelans — attend a Make America Great Again rally. A Democratic administration could claim that participants of the rally supported an enemy of the United States by, for example, opposing aid to Ukraine. That administration could then try to deport the immigrants for their speech.

This is the slippery slope of exceptions to free speech and other constitutional rights: What counts as a violent act? What is a terrorist group? Who is an enemy of the United States? What does it mean to support them? A president can twist the answers to these questions to fit any agenda and go after people with opposing views, bypassing fundamental rights.

The Guardian:  The North Dakota ruling against Greenpeace is a threat to free speech

By Sushma Raman and Anthony Romero

.....The first amendment guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. It will have little meaning if multibillion-dollar corporations can sue peaceful protesters out of existence for their speech. Yet, that’s exactly what was decided in a small courtroom in Morton county, North Dakota.

InsideRadio: DHS, FBI Take Action: FCC’s Carr Speaks Out After Swatting Attacks.

.....Following a recent rise in “swatting” incidents aimed at conservative audio hosts — among them the nationally-syndicated Joe “Pags” Pagliarulo and “Ungoverned” podcast host Shawn Farash — FCC Chairman Brendan Carr has posted a statement on social media site X, while the heads of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the FBI have doubled-down on tracking those responsible…

“The recent surge in ‘swatting’ attacks against conservatives is a dangerous form of political violence,” Carr posted. “I’ve been in touch with law enforcement to ensure they have access to the trace-back resources that locate a call’s originating point. Bad actors will face accountability.”

Meanwhile, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posted on X, “We will not sit idly by as conservative new[s] media and their families are being targeted by false swatting. We will hunt these cowards down. This is an attack on our law enforcement and innocent families, and we will prosecute it as such.”

The States

People United for Privacy: H. 399’s First Amendment-Friendly Reforms to Idaho’s Outdated, Unconstitutional, and Privacy-Invasive Campaign Finance Laws

By Heather Lauer

.....As the Legislature takes an important step toward modernizing Idaho’s archaic and convoluted campaign finance statutes, several changes in H. 399 are critical for ensuring that the First Amendment rights of individuals and nonprofits are protected.

Our comments focus on current requirements in Idaho law that compel nonprofit organizations to publicly expose their members and supporters. Nonprofit donors have a First Amendment-protected right to privacy in association, and campaign finance reporting requirements are a narrow exception to that right. Idahoans must be free to support social causes without being subjected to the privacy invasions of campaign finance law. Likewise, nonprofits must be free to voice an opinion on government actions when they affect issues core to their mission.

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