Wednesday, August 05, 2020
#FREESPEECH in the News August 5, 2020
As the Citadel of Free Speech here in Cleveland, we work to protect and promote the basis of our democracy by sharing related stories, commentary, and opinions on free speech in the 21st century. Here's what's making the news – and what you should know about – in the past week.
1.) Lawmakers, civil rights experts testify on protecting free speech amid protests
Lawmakers on the Senate subcommittee on the Constitution held a hearing on free speech regarding the right of peaceful assembly.
The committee’s chair, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said the hearing centered on “how Antifa and other anarchists are hijacking peaceful protests and engaging in political violence that is not only criminal, but antithetical to the First Amendment” in a statement issued in July.
President Donald Trump has blamed the loosely defined group for violence at protests around the country in response to the police killing of George Floyd. Last week, Attorney General William Barr told the House Judiciary Committee that the group was “heavily represented” at some protests, but did not offer specific evidence.
The panels of witnesses who spoke at the hearing, included Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services acting director Ken Cuccinelli.
2.) Student Sues Fordham Claiming His Right to Free Speech is Under Attack
Since Austin Tong, Gabelli School of Business at Lincoln Center ’21, first declared he would fight the university’s disciplinary actions, his story has garnered national attention and received an outpour of support for his right to freedom of speech and to bear arms.
The university found Tong’s two Instagram posts were in violation of the university regulations related to bias and hate crimes and were threatening or intimidating behavior. Tong maintains that these claims are an attack on his free speech as an American and officially filed a lawsuit in the New York County Supreme Court on July 23.
Tong first posted an image of David Dorn, a Black police officer who was killed in the protests, with the caption “Y’all a bunch of hypocrites.”
Tong posted the picture holding the semi-automatic weapon the following day with the caption “Don’t tread on me #198964,” which he says was to commemorate the Tiananmen Square massacre in China.
3.) Trump’s Twitter blocking is center of new free speech lawsuit
President Trump was accused of continuing to block critics from his Twitter account two years after a judge said silencing detractors on the social media platform was a violation of the First Amendment.
The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed a lawsuit Friday on behalf of five people who still can’t access the realDonaldTrump Twitter account, which has 84.4 million followers. The complaint names Trump’s deputy chief of staff for communications, Daniel Scavino.
The free speech group says the White House unblocked the plaintiffs from the first lawsuit as well as dozens of others who were blocked on the basis of their viewpoint.
But it says the White House has refused to unblock Twitter critics who fall into two categories: those who can’t pinpoint the tweet that provoked Trump to block them, and those who were blocked before the president took office. The new lawsuit will focus mostly on those categories, the group said.