This is the Daily Media Update published by the Institute for Free Speech. For press inquiries, please contact [email protected].
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Supreme Court
By David McCabe
.....For years, giant social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have operated under two crucial tenets.
The first is that the platforms have the power to decide what content to keep online and what to take down, free from government oversight. The second is that the websites cannot be held legally responsible for most of what their users post online, shielding the companies from lawsuits over libelous speech, extremist content and real-world harm linked to their platforms.
Now the Supreme Court is poised to reconsider those rules, potentially leading to the most significant reset of the doctrines governing online speech since U.S. officials and courts decided to apply few regulations to the web in the 1990s.
On Friday, the Supreme Court is expected to discuss whether to hear two cases that challenge laws in Texas and Florida barring online platforms from taking down certain political content. Next month, the court is scheduled to hear a case that questions Section 230, a 1996 statute that protects the platforms from liability for the content posted by their users.
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Congress
By Lauren Sforza
.....A group of House Democrats introduced a constitutional amendment on Thursday to overturn a Supreme Court ruling that eliminated restrictions on corporate campaign spending...
This amendment, if passed, would allow Congress and state governments to enact “reasonable, viewpoint-neutral” limitations on campaign funding, including restricting corporations from spending “unlimited amounts of money to influence elections.”
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who introduced the amendment, said in a press release that it would “close legal loopholes” that corporations and other wealthy groups have “exploited for far too long.” Schiff has introduced an amendment to overturn the Citizens United ruling every year since 2013, according to the release.
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Free Expression
By Jennifer Schuessler and Marc Tracy
.....The Harvard Kennedy School reversed course on Thursday and said it would offer a fellowship to a leading human rights advocate it had previously rejected, after news of the decision touched off a public outcry over academic freedom, donor influence and the boundaries of criticism of Israel.
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Nonprofits
By S.V. Date
.....Donald Trump promised Thursday to deliver a “big political speech” at the “annual roundtable” for Judicial Watch ― a tax-exempt charity that under the law is not supposed to be engaging in politics at all…
Robert Maguire of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington said Judicial Watch’s coziness with Trump is proof that the IRS is incapable of enforcing regulations on tax-exempt groups. “This is further evidence of the absolute inability of the IRS to take action against these groups that are clearly political outfits that are using their tax-exempt status as a shield,” he said…
Lloyd Mayer, a professor and tax-exempt organizations expert at Notre Dame University’s law school, said Judicial Watch had the right to invite Trump as a former president and would not be breaking rules so long as Trump did not speak about his campaign. “And even if Trump makes such a mention, if Judicial Watch instructed him not to but he went off script, Judicial Watch would have a defense because it could claim it took reasonable measures to avoid any such mention,” Mayer said…
Marcus Owens, a former head of the Exempt Organizations Division at the IRS, said a “narrowly tailored” speech by Trump about his experience as president was legitimate. “The challenge for Judicial Watch is that it’s very difficult to imagine Donald Trump staying on script and not talking about his political future,” he said.
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The States
By John Russell
Not-for-profit organizations in Indiana would be permitted to keep the identity of their members and donors secret under a bill now advancing through the Indiana General Assembly.
Senate Bill 303 would prohibit any government agency from requiring a not-for-profit to provide any information that would identify members, supporters, volunteers or donors.
The Indiana Senate Judiciary Committee voted 9-0 Wednesday afternoon to send the legislation to the floor for consideration...
Since 2014, states have considered more than 200 bills that would force not-for-profits to disclose the identity of donors, said Holly Davis, a vice president at the Indiana Philanthropy Alliance, a network of foundations, company and social investors...
“There are countless reasons why an individual may want to keep their charitable giving private,” said Danielle Coulter, representing the Philanthropy Roundtable, a group that advises large donors to charities. “It includes but is not limited to general privacy concerns, religious convictions, mere modesty, a desire to avoid unwanted solicitations by others, wanting the focus to remain solely on the cause they support, and not simply the fact they donated more, or fear or harassment or retaliation.”
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.....LB 9 would, if passed, clamp down on so-called “dark money” groups that sponsor political advertising, especially prior to elections. The measure would force disclosures about issue-related, noncandidate spending that has been regularly seen on the airwaves in recent years...
Sen. Blood and Jack Gould of Common Cause Nebraska would like to see LB 9 passed in order to force identification of those who contribute financially to the groups that then sponsor the advertising...
On the other side are those who point out that some donors have good reasons for wanting to stay anonymous — those who own and operate businesses, for example.
“The effect of such disclosure has resulted in the harassment and intimidation of donors to groups that are disfavored by the media and the ‘cancel culture,’ ” said Sandy Danek of Nebraska Right to Life.
Jessica Shelburn of Americans for Prosperity — which is one of the “dark money” groups in question — said her concerns are that government should be committed to “making it easier, not harder” for people to participate in the electoral process. The provisions of LB 9, she has said, might also limit discourse and undermine free speech.
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By Ethan Geringer-Sameth
.....The New York City Council is expected to pass legislation this week that would require entities spending to influence voters in local referendums to disclose their funders.
The law would close a loophole in the city's campaign finance law that lawmakers, good government groups, and campaign finance regulators have decried for years. If signed by the mayor, so-called independent expenditures (IEs) of $5,000 or more would be subject to disclosure to the New York City Campaign Finance Board. As would the names of the owners and officers of the entity behind the spending, and the names of its major contributors – the same requirements that currently apply to IE spending for or against candidate campaigns.
The legislation, which would amend the City Charter, would also require ads for or against ballot questions to include a "paid for by" notice, including the names of up to three of its top donors.
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Read an article you think we would be interested in? Send it to Tiffany Donnelly at [email protected]. For email filters, the subject of this email will always begin with "Institute for Free Speech Media Update."
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The Institute for Free Speech is a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that promotes and defends the First Amendment rights to freely speak, assemble, publish, and petition the government. Please support the Institute's mission by clicking here. For further information, visit www.ifs.org.
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