This is the Daily Media Update published by the Institute for Free Speech. For press inquiries, please contact [email protected].
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In the News
.....Ed. note: IFS Chairman and former FEC Chair Bradley A. Smith joins host Sean Hannity to discuss the federal campaign finance law underlying the expected Trump indictment. Mr. Smith is introduced at 8 min. 8 sec. and interviewed at 11 min. 55 sec.
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By Kate Ackley
.....Florida Democratic Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost and a slate of former congressional candidates urged the Federal Election Commission on Wednesday to loosen restrictions on using campaign funds for salaries and benefits for those seeking federal office.
Making it easier for candidates to draw a regular salary, plus health care and other benefits, would help encourage more diversity among House, Senate and presidential hopefuls, they argued…
But the commission also heard opposition to the idea from Bradley Smith, a former Republican chairman of the FEC and a founder of the Institute for Free Speech. He said current campaign finance laws do not give the FEC the authority to allow candidates to take salaries because of restrictions against personal use of contributor money and that Congress should take up the issue.
Candidates currently may give themselves a salary from campaign funds, but they face restrictions on when they can start to take a salary and how much they can take.
The FEC published proposed changes in the Federal Register late last year. The agency is wrestling with how much the cap should be and when payments could begin — such as when someone files to run — and end.
Smith said there’s a potential for corruption, but witnesses arguing for the changes said that the public disclosure of those expenditures would likely guard against potential grifters.
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By Angele Latham
.....Moms for Liberty of Wilson County, a local branch of the conservative activist group, has filed a federal lawsuit against the Wilson County Board of Education, accusing the board of violating the group’s First Amendment right to speak in a public meeting.
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The Courts
.....A Maryland judge found in favor of a county on the First Amendment lawsuit brought by gun shops and a Second Amendment nonprofit over an ordinance requiring gun stores to give customers literature about “suicide prevention and nonviolent conflict resolution.” The pamphlets constitute commercial speech, and their contents are factual and uncontroversial — and the requirement is reasonably related to the county’s interest in reducing violence and suicides — so the county prevails.
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By Steve Warren
.....A New Jersey mother who says she was treated like a terrorist for questioning offensive signs at a local school last November is now suing nine individuals who she says violated her civil rights.
Attorneys with the Thomas More Society, a nonprofit, public interest law firm, are representing Angela Reading. They filed a lawsuit on March 15, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. Reading is a third-year law student, mother of two, and respected member of her county's regional board of education.
The 62-page lawsuit alleges that the police chief of North Hanover Township, acting in combination with military personnel from the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, coerced the removal of her Facebook post in which she objected to sexually explicit material posted in the hallway of a local elementary school. She spoke up because her children were exposed to the material.
The named defendants then portrayed her as a "security threat" and reported her to various law enforcement and security agencies in an effort to retaliate against her and make her afraid to speak out in the future.
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Free Expression
By Stuart Kyle Duncan
.....The most disturbing aspect of this shameful debacle is what it says about the state of legal education. Stanford is an elite law school. The protesters showed not the foggiest grasp of the basic concepts of legal discourse: That one must meet reason with reason, not power. That jeering contempt is the opposite of persuasion. That the law protects the speaker from the mob, not the mob from the speaker. Worst of all, Ms. Steinbach’s remarks made clear she is proud that Stanford students are being taught this is the way law should be.
I have been criticized in the media for getting angry at the protesters. It’s true I called them “appalling idiots,” “bullies” and “hypocrites.” They are, and I won’t apologize for saying so. Sometimes anger is the proper response to vicious behavior.
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By Madison Alder
.....Stanford Law School is requiring all students to attend educational programming on free speech after protesters interrupted a speech by a conservative federal judge earlier this month.
The law school will hold “a mandatory half-day session in spring quarter for all students on the topic of freedom of speech and the norms of the legal profession,” Stanford Law School Dean Jenny Martinez said in a public letter to students Wednesday.
Associate Dean Tirien Steinbach, who spoke at the March 9 event with US Judge Kyle Duncan, “is currently on leave,” Martinez said.
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Online Speech Platforms
By Jacob Sullum
.....Disinformation and misinformation have always been contested categories, defined by the fallible and frequently subjective judgments of public officials and other government-endorsed experts. But malinformation is even more clearly in the eye of the beholder, since it is defined not by its alleged inaccuracy but by its perceived threat to public health, democracy, or national security, which often amounts to nothing more than questioning the wisdom, honesty, or authority of those experts.
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The States
By Katie Bernard
.....The Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission, Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s office and attorneys representing a Republican consultant under investigation for campaign finance violations came to an agreement Tuesday on an overhaul of the commission.
The compromise bill represents a major departure from the wide ranging legislation Republican lawmakers began pursuing earlier in the legislative session. The legislation was introduced after Senate President Ty Masterson, an Andover Republican, said he wanted to pursue changes to the commission because he felt Mark Skoglund, the director of the state’s ethics watchdog, had taken on an “activist” role.
Masterson said Tuesday he would move the legislation forward if it reached his chamber but had not been involved in negotiations.
In the past year, Skoglund has subpoenaed several Republican officials in the course of an investigation into alleged campaign finance violations.
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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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