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  PEN America · [email protected]
July 9, 2025 at 10:26 PM

PEN America News: Setbacks for Press Freedom and the Right to Read

July 9, 2025 Supreme Court Establishes a New Frontier for Book Bans  The Supreme Court decision in Mahmoud v. Taylor that religious parents have the right to remove their children from classroom lessons featuring LGBTQ+-themed picture books is a deeply disappointing blow to the right to read. The r…
  PEN America · [email protected]
June 25, 2025 at 9:25 PM

PEN America News: Freedom for Ukrainian Journalist

Today, we celebrate Vlad’s freedom. Tomorrow, we recommit to the fight for every writer and journalist still unjustly imprisoned in and by Russia June 25, 2025 A Joyful Day for Vladyslav Yesypenko  We are overjoyed that Ukrainian journalist Vladyslav Yesypenko, our 2022 PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write A…
  PEN America · [email protected]
June 11, 2025 at 9:16 PM

Public Media on the Line: Urgent Action Alert

Send an email to your Member of Congress today and urge them to defend public media. June 11, 2025Congress Votes in Days: Tell Your Representative to  Defend Public Media The Trump Administration is attempting to claw back funds from rural and local public media in a blatant attempt to silence medi…
  PEN America · [email protected]
May 28, 2025 at 7:35 PM

PEN America News: ‘Free Speech Is Something We Have to Fight For’

"...We can joke about it – until we can’t. That’s the reality of where we’re at right now." Amber Ruffin at the PEN America Literary Gala May 28, 2025 Celebrating Defenders of Free Speech “Free speech is something we have to fight for. We can joke about it – until we can’t. That’s the reality of whe…
  PEN America · [email protected]
May 14, 2025 at 6:45 PM

PEN America News: And the winners are...

The PEN America Literary Awards gathered legendary authors and new voices to celebrate literature at this pivotal moment. May 14, 2025 Celebrating the Best of LiteratureWe brought the “Oscars of Books” back for the 61st year in style, honoring 13 awardees across multiple genres. Hosted by two-time E…
  PEN America · [email protected]
April 30, 2025 at 5:32 PM

PEN America News: A Five-Alarm Fire for Free Expression

And it's only been 100 days. April 30, 2025The 100 Day Assault on Free Expression In its first 100 days, the Trump administration launched a frontal assault on freedom of expression unlike anything seen in this country since the McCarthy era. Through vague, vitriolic, and overbroad executive orders …
  PEN America · [email protected]
April 16, 2025 at 9:30 PM

PEN America News: We’re Back in Court Fighting Book Bans in Tennessee

On behalf of our author members, we're challenging book removals that violate their right to freedom of expression. April 16, 2025 PEN America sues in Tennessee Today we joined a federal lawsuit as a plaintiff in Rutherford County, Tennessee, defending the constitutional right to read and write. Wit…
  PEN America · [email protected]
April 2, 2025 at 9:16 PM

PEN America News: What the Trump Administration Doesn’t Want You to Say

We compiled a list of more than 250 words and phrases reportedly no longer considered acceptable by the Trump administration. April 2, 2025Everything They Don’t Want You to Say A growing list of words is being scrubbed from government websites and documents to remove all references not only to diver…
  PEN America · [email protected]
March 19, 2025 at 9:01 PM

PEN America News: Celebrating the Power of Words

We hope you can join us for our upcoming events celebrating the power of literature and free expression. March 19, 2025 Save the Date for Our Spring Events We hope you can join us for our upcoming events celebrating the power of literature and free expression. The 2025 PEN World Voices Festival will…
  PEN America · [email protected]
March 5, 2025 at 7:31 PM

PEN America News: Why Books Get Banned

A close look at the more than 10,000 instances of book bans in the last school year. March 5, 2025Cover to Cover: A Book Ban Analysis We took a close look at the more than 10,000 instances of book bans in the last school year and found that more than half of banned titles featured characters or peop…
  PEN America · [email protected]
February 19, 2025 at 10:01 PM

PEN America News: Whose 'Golden Age'?

We won’t lose focus or stop protecting free speech and the arts. Join us.February 19, 2025 The ‘Golden Age’ That Isn’t Less than a month into the Trump presidency, it’s hard to keep track of all the ways the administration has attacked culture and free speech. Banning words like “gender” and “divers…
  PEN America · [email protected]
February 5, 2025 at 10:01 PM

PEN America News: The Word Police

There is no act of censorship more explicit than literally banning words.February 5, 2025The Word Police After the Trump administration issued an executive order declaring government censorship of speech “intolerable in a free society,” it immediately set about doing just that. Subsequent executive …
  PEN America · [email protected]
January 29, 2025 at 7:21 PM

Making a Stand for Truth

Special Edition January 29, 2025Dear Friend, In George Orwell’s frequently banned book 1984, the Ministry of Truth is responsible for lies. It decides what “truth” is and rewrites history with its own government-approved version of events. Real history is dropped into “memory holes” and incinerated…