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
.....Sebastian talks to parents' rights advocate Simon Campbell about how he won his fight against a corrupt school board that tried to suppress the free speech of concerned parents. Ed. note: Introduction begins at 2 min. 4 sec. Learn more about the case here.
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Supreme Court
By Adam Liptak
.....The Supreme Court heard arguments on Monday in a First Amendment challenge to an unusual federal law that makes it a crime to “encourage” unauthorized immigrants to come to or stay in the United States.
Read literally, several justices suggested, the law would chill constitutionally protected speech.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor asked about a grandmother living in the United States without authorization. “The grandmother tells her son she’s worried about the burden she’s putting on the family,” the justice said. “And the son says: ‘Abuelita, you are never a burden to us. If you want to continue living here with us, your grandchildren love having you.’”
Justice Sotomayor asked whether the government could prosecute the son.
Brian H. Fletcher, a lawyer for the federal government defending the law, did not give a definitive answer. “I think not,” he said.
That frustrated Justice Sotomayor. “Stop qualifying with ‘think,’ because the minute you start qualifying with ‘think,’ then you’re rendering asunder the First Amendment,” she said. “People have to know what they can talk about.”
Justice Elena Kagan said it was not hard to imagine violations of the law based on the ordinary meaning of the word “encourage.”
“What happens to all the cases where it could be a lawyer, it could be a doctor, it could be a neighbor, it could be a friend, it could be a teacher, it could be anybody says to a noncitizen, ‘I really think you should stay?’” she asked.
Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh wondered about charitable organizations. “There’s still going to be a chill or a threat of prosecution for them for providing food and shelter and aid and recommending people for scholarships,” he said.
Mr. Fletcher said the justice was describing conduct rather than speech. Justice Kavanaugh responded that the charitable aid might be accompanied by a statement like, “I want you to stay here and I’m going to help you.”
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By Ronald Mann
.....As expected, Wednesday’s argument in Jack Daniel’s Properties v VIP Products showcased the justices grappling with line-drawing. At issue in the case was how First Amendment trademark principles should apply to a dog toy that pokes fun at Jack Daniel’s whiskey – a toy the size and shape of a Jack Daniel’s bottle, bearing a familiar-looking label that reads “Bad Spaniels” instead of “Jack Daniel’s.”
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The Courts
By Judy Harrison
.....A conservative activist who successfully sued Regional School Unit 22 in Hampden after the school board banned him from its meetings has sued the board a second time alleging that his right to free speech again has been limited.
Shawn McBreairty, 52, of Hampden on Friday filed a lawsuit against Heath Miller, the board chair, and members of the RSU 22 school committee, in U.S. District Court in Bangor...
McBreairty claims the rule that forbids negative public comments about district employees is unconstitutional and violates his First Amendment right to free speech. The complaint said that when McBreairty attempted to criticize two teachers by name at the last two meetings, he was shut down.
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IRS
By The Editorial Board
.....Democrats are denouncing the House GOP investigation into the weaponization of government, but maybe that’s because Republicans are getting somewhere. That includes new evidence that the Internal Revenue Service may be targeting a journalist who testified before the weaponization committee.
House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan sent a letter Monday to IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen seeking an explanation for why journalist Matt Taibbi received an unannounced home visit from an IRS agent. We’ve seen the letter, and both the circumstances and timing of the IRS focus on this journalist raise serious questions.
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DHS
By Matt Taibbi and Susan Schmidt
.....The Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to present a less Orwellian exterior to the public took a big step forward this week, as it disbanded a key subcommittee linked to the Department’s ill-fated Disinformation Governance Board, announced last year and quickly “paused” amid public outcry.
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Free Expression
By Josh Blackman
.....Much has been said about what Dean Tirien Steinbach said. But a better question is why was she the one to speak? SLS has many associate deans who could have represented the administration. Indeed, there were several deans present in the room, including Jeanne Merino, the acting associate dean of students. Why did the DEI Dean speak at the podium?
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The States
By Steven Lemongello
.....The GOP-backed bills to make it easier to sue the news media in Florida face opposition from conservatives, including Republican U.S. Rep. Cory Mills and the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity, who call the measures unconstitutional.
“This bill is encouraging the state to violate its citizens’ fundamental rights as Americans and is not only unpatriotic, but it is not representative of the free state of Florida,” Mills wrote in a letter to leaders of the Florida House and Senate last week.
But on Friday, Florida House Speaker Paul Renner said in response that the House bill, in fact, was meant to challenge established constitutional law. He said the goal was to trigger legal challenges that would result in the U.S. Supreme Court overturning established precedents on defamation laws, most notably the Times vs. Sullivan decision.
Both Senate Bill 1220, filed by state Sen. Jason Brodeur, R-Sanford, and House Bill 991, filed by Rep. Alex Andrade, R-Pensacola, propose sweeping changes to Florida’s libel and defamation law. If passed, the bills would automatically presume information from anonymous sources to be false and would prevent journalists from shielding the identity of sources if they are sued.
HB 991 would also expand the definition of defamation to giving “publicity” about someone that would be “highly offensive to a reasonable person,” and included language that someone can be defamed if they are accused of discriminating based on race, sex, sexual orientation or gender identity, even if it’s true.
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By Matt Friedman
.....Public records activist CJ Griffin on Friday released several more emails of ELEC Executive Director Jeff Brindle expressing frustration with LGTBQ issues...There’s another email in which Brindle expressed support for a student who had a problem with the Black Lives Matter movement.
You can read the emails here. One big difference between these emails and the one with a similar tone that landed Brindle in trouble with the Murphy administration — lamenting not being able to celebrate a couple presidents’ birthdays while recognizing National Coming Out Day — is that nobody filed a complaint against him for sending any of these. That we know of, anyway...
That said, this raises an important question: Where’s the line between political opinion and discrimination, and how do you draw it fairly? For instance, when Brindle wrote “we truly are living through insane times,” it was in response to a conservative website’s article about a trans inmate at a women’s prison who impregnated other inmates. Isn’t that a legitimate topic for debate? And if Brindle’s email to the staffer who filed the complaint did violate state’s discrimination policy, there are channels through which he could face discipline. Should we look back at the Murphy administration’s actions against its staffer who publicly denigrated evangelical Christians? (It was 10 days unpaid suspension and sensitivity training.)
The new emails should make ELEC’s Tuesday hearing on Brindle more eventful. But this doesn’t change the fact that the Murphy administration’s initial attempt to oust Brindle through a last-minute legislative amendment was a power grab that happened just as the Legislature sought to rein in the agency with a short and retroactive statute of limitations.
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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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