We’re Hiring!
Senior Attorneys – Institute for Free Speech – Washington, DC or Virtual Office
The Institute for Free Speech is hiring three attorneys, including at least one Senior Attorney with at least 10 years of experience and two other experienced attorneys with at least four to six years of experience in an expansion of its litigation and legal advocacy capabilities.
This is a rare opportunity to work with a growing team to litigate a long-term legal strategy directed toward the protection of Constitutional rights. You would work to secure legal precedents clearing away a thicket of laws and regulations that suppress speech about government and candidates for political office, threaten citizens’ privacy if they speak or join groups, and impose heavy burdens on organized political activity.
A strong preference will be given to candidates who can work in our Washington, D.C. headquarters. However, we will consider exceptionally strong candidates living and working virtually from anywhere in the country. In addition to litigation or advocacy-related travel, a virtual candidate would be required to travel for quarterly week-long visits to IFS’s headquarters after the pandemic’s impact has receded.
[You can learn more about this role and apply for the position here.]
Congress
By Grover Norquist
Congressional Democrats have a plan to forever keep Republicans from winning elections and influencing policy decisions with H.R. 1 in the House, and the similar S. 1 in the Senate.
They want to empower the government to police more speech, force states to allow vote-by-mail and taxpayer funding of candidates, and silence Americans through fear by exposing their support for issue groups…
The mess of bad and unconstitutional policies in H.R. 1 are an existential threat to the Republican Party. They would shatter the ability of Americans to effectively organize, support causes they believe in, and hold government accountable…
Taxpayers would be on the hook for matching 600% of campaign contributions to subsidize candidates they may disagree with – a practice that has been ripe for corruption…
New standards for “coordination” would be broad and confusing. All speech that simply mentions a candidate could be illegal four months out from an election if groups speak to the public. Worse, at any time, any funded communication that mentions an issue that might be associated with a politician could be illegal.
The government just has to say the speech “promotes,” “attacks,” “supports” or “opposes” a potential candidate.
Philanthropy
Philanthropy Roundtable: Washington Update: Policy News That Could Shake Up Philanthropy
By Debi Ghate
One of the Roundtable’s key sources for updates about important behind-the-scenes developments that could potentially impact philanthropic freedom and excellence is Sandra Swirski of Urban Swirski & Associates, based in Washington, D.C… In last week’s update, Sandra noted several “good to know” news items below.
On Monday, January 25, the U.S. Senate confirmed Janet Yellen as the next U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. From Sandra’s update on Yellen’s testimony during her January 19 confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance, she highlights that Yellen’s comments included:
“…the Biden administration’s top priority initially will be providing additional COVID relief in the short term, followed by revisiting parts of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in the long term. Of note, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) raised concern that the IRS was not doing enough to enforce tax-exempt policies, mentioning the ‘dark money’ that funded some of the organizations involved in the January 6th Capitol attack. Whitehouse asked Yellen if she would commit to a formal review of tax-exempt policies for 501(c) organizations, for which she said she would once she was up to speed on this issue…
Sandra also noted increased calls from members of Congress asking the IRS to investigate tax-exempt organizations for potential participation in illegal activities:
FEC
Federal Election Commission: Contribution limits for 2021-2022
Under the Federal Election Campaign Act (the Act), certain contribution limits are indexed for inflation every two years, based on the change in the cost of living since 2001, which is the base year for adjusting these limits. The inflation-adjusted limits are:
- The limits on contributions made by persons to candidates (increased to $2,900 per election, per candidate) (52 U.S.C. § 30116(a)(1)(A));
- The limits on contributions made by persons to national party committees (increased to $36,500 per calendar year) (52 U.S.C. § 30116(a)(1)(B));
- The limit on contributions made by certain political party committees to Senate candidates (increased to $51,200 per campaign) (52 U.S.C. § 30116(h)).
Biden Administration
New York Times: How the Biden Administration Can Help Solve Our Reality Crisis
By Kevin Roose
Hoaxes, lies and collective delusions aren’t new, but the extent to which millions of Americans have embraced them may be…
So I called a number of experts and asked what the Biden administration could do to help fix our truth-challenged information ecosystem, or at least prevent it from getting worse…
Several experts I spoke with recommended that the Biden administration put together a cross-agency task force to tackle disinformation and domestic extremism, which would be led by something like a “reality czar.” …
Renée DiResta, a disinformation researcher at Stanford’s Internet Observatory, gave the example of two seemingly unrelated problems: misinformation about Covid-19 and misinformation about election fraud.
Often, she said, the same people and groups are responsible for spreading both types. So instead of two parallel processes – one at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, aimed at tamping down Covid-related conspiracy theories, and another at the Federal Election Commission, trying to correct voting misinformation – a centralized task force could coordinate a single, strategic response…
This task force could also meet regularly with tech platforms, and push for structural changes that could help those companies tackle their own extremism and misinformation problems. (For example, it could formulate “safe harbor” exemptions that would allow platforms to share data about QAnon and other conspiracy theory communities with researchers and government agencies without running afoul of privacy laws.) And it could become the tip of the spear for the federal government’s response to the reality crisis.
Daily Beast: White House Reporters: Biden Team Wanted Our Questions in Advance
By Maxwell Tani
If you’re a reporter with a tough question for the White House press secretary, Joe Biden’s staff wouldn’t mind knowing about it in advance.
According to three sources with knowledge of the matter, as well as written communications reviewed by The Daily Beast, the new president’s communications staff have already on occasion probed reporters to see what questions they plan on asking new White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki when called upon during briefings.
The requests prompted concerns among the White House press corps, whose members, like many reporters, are sensitive to the perception that they are coordinating with political communications staffers…
“While it’s a relief to see briefings return, particularly with a commitment to factual information, the press can’t really do its job in the briefing room if the White House is picking and choosing the questions they want,” one White House correspondent said. “That’s not really a free press at all.”
Free Speech
The Hill: Trump lawyer to make First Amendment case at impeachment trial
By Jonathan Easley
A lawyer representing former President Trump at his impeachment trial next week plans to argue that convicting Trump of inciting a riot would imperil all political speech.
Speaking Monday night on Fox News’s “Hannity,” attorney David Schoen laid out a three-pronged strategy for Trump’s defense.
Schoen and attorney Bruce Castor plan to argue that it is unconstitutional to impeach a former president, that some of the rioters planned to storm the Capitol before Trump addressed his supporters and that convicting Trump would set a precedent that could severely curtail political speech going forward.
“Besides the fact that this process is completely unconstitutional … this is a very, very dangerous road to take with respect to the First Amendment, putting at risk any passionate political speaker, which is against everything we believe in this country,” Schoen said.
Online Speech Platforms
Techdirt: No, Getting Rid Of Anonymity Will Not Fix Social Media; It Will Cause More Problems
By Mike Masnick
[A] friend of Techdirt, Andy Kessler, wrote a piece for the Wall Street Journal calling for the end of anonymity online…
He’s wrong, and we’ll get into why in a moment. But, tragically, his piece has picked up some supporters in high places. Senator Ron Johnson, one of the key enablers of spreading disinformation in Congress (under his own name, of course), tweeted a link to the article, saying that perhaps we should end anonymity online…
That says:
I’m concerned that Congress’s involvement in Section 230 reform may lead to more harm than good.
One solution may be to end user anonymity on social media platforms. Social media companies need to know who their customers are so bad actors can be held accountable.
The next day, Senator John Kennedy, another famed Senatorial spreader of disinformation under his own name, announced that he was going to introduce legislation to ban anonymity online. Specifically, he said social media companies would have to verify the legal identities of every user, and said that this would “cause a lot of people” to “think about their words.”
There are three big problems with this idea:
-
-
- It’s unconstitutional.
- It doesn’t work.
- It creates real harms & puts marginalized and vulnerable people at risk.
-
Candidates and Campaigns
New York Times: Trump’s Sleight of Hand: Shouting Fraud, Pocketing Donors’ Cash for Future
By Shane Goldmacher and Rachel Shorey
Former President Donald J. Trump and the Republican Party leveraged false claims of voter fraud and promises to overturn the election to raise more than a quarter-billion dollars in November and December as hundreds of thousands of trusting supporters listened and opened their wallets.
But the Trump campaign spent only a tiny fraction of its haul on lawyers and other legal bills related to those claims…
Mr. Trump’s extraordinary success raising money came mostly from grass-roots and online contributors drawn to his lie that the election result would soon be somehow wiped away. Only about a dozen donors gave $25,000 or more to one of Mr. Trump’s committees after Nov. 24. (The lone six-figure donation came from Elaine J. Wold, a major Republican donor in Florida.)
“Sophisticated donors are not dumb,” said Dan Eberhart, a major Republican donor who has supported Mr. Trump in the past. “They could see through what Trump was trying to do.” …
One of the few five-figure checks deposited in December came from the National Fraternal Order of Police PAC. But its executive director, James Pasco, said the group had actually issued the $25,000 donation in early November. He said he did not know why it hadn’t been cashed until December.
“The optics of this are terrible,” Mr. Pasco lamented. “We in no way questioned the election at any point, or were involved in an effort to forestall the results.”
The States
Missouri Times: ‘Cancel culture’ should not be enshrined into law
By Gregg Keller
Compelled disclosure of donor information of private non-profit entities is not a new concept. Advocates on both sides of the issue have pushed for new laws and rule changes in state and federal government. Unfortunately, the cancel culture trend has grown so out of control that there is a real fear of retaliation for supporting private causes.
While attacks of privacy rights take different forms across the country, in Missouri the typical avenue is through our state’s campaign finance laws. Missouri’s most liberal legislators file legislation on an annual basis in an attempt to force private non-profit organizations to disclose the personal information of their donors. Such legislation threatens to undermine the Constitutional protection of the First Amendment rights of speech, assembly, and association from government restriction…
Fortunately for Missourians, courageous leaders in the Missouri legislature, Sen. Andrew Koenig and Rep. Jered Taylor, proactively filed legislation to protect the rights of private individuals. The Personal Privacy Protection Act would bar any public entity from disclosing personal information, not including that already required by law, which would identify someone as a member or donor of a non-profit organization.
Six states have already passed their own versions of the Personal Privacy Protection Act and another seven, including Missouri, have introduced it in their current sessions.
KCCI Des Moines: Bill making political beliefs a protected class proposed to combat ‘cancel culture’
By Cynthia Fodor
Iowa lawmakers are considering a bill that would protect people from discrimination based on their political beliefs.
The measure would make political ideology a protected class in the Iowa Civil Rights Act, along with race, religion, gender identity and sexual orientation.
Rep. Steven Holt, R-Denison, said he sponsored the bill to push back against “cancel culture.”
“We seem to be getting to this point with this ‘woke culture’ and ‘cancel culture’ that we can’t disagree without folks getting so upset they want to destroy other people,” Holt said. “So, that’s why I advanced this bill and I think it’s an important discussion we need to have.”
LGBTQ advocacy group One Iowa said it opposes the measure.
“If we’re saying political ideology is protected in the workplace in all circumstances, then how are we going to address issues when someone is saying extremely inappropriate things to their coworkers under the guise that this is their political ideology?” One Iowa lobbyist Keenan Crow said.
Crow said One Iowa agrees it is important to protect free speech and freedom of expression but is concerned because the measure does not define political ideology.
GoLocalProv: Employees Shouldn’t Be Guaranteed a Workplace Devoid of Differing Political Views, Says ACLU’s Brown
Last week, GoLocal broke that the administration of Providence Mayor Jorge Elorza warned employees against political speech at work.
The memo, which cited some recently reported political conversations among employees as creating “tension and undue stress,” told city workers to inform HR if they are part of, or witness, a conversation that makes them “uncomfortable.”
Now, Steve Brown, the Executive Director of the Rhode Island American Civil Liberties Union, weighed in on the memo — its goals.
“The memo goes confusingly astray by implying that any political conversations at work are problematic. Government work is inherently political to some degree, and if some people want to swap differing political views at the water cooler in a socially distant manner, they should be able to do so without fear of punishment,” said Brown.
“Unlawful harassment can take many forms and should be addressed, but policies aimed at stifling pure speech, even in the workplace, should be more carefully crafted to avoid confusion and over-reaching,” he said. “City employees should not be guaranteed a workplace devoid of differing political views and conversation.”
