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.]
New from the Institute for Free Speech
Senate Testimony: S. 1 Would Suppress Speech, Violate the First Amendment
Institute for Free Speech Chairman Bradley A. Smith will tell the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration today that S. 1 threatens free speech and privacy. Smith’s testimony explains that the bill’s extensive regulations on speech would silence many Americans while benefiting politicians and Washington insiders. Many of the legislation’s proposals are unconstitutional.
“Labeling this bill the ‘For the People Act’ is Orwellian. In reality, S. 1 would subsidize the speech of politicians while suppressing the speech of the people… Significant portions of the bill would violate the privacy of advocacy groups and their supporters – including those groups who do nothing more than speak about policy issues before Congress or federal judicial nominees. Other key provisions would limit political speech on the Internet and compel speakers to recite lengthy government-mandated messages in their communications, instead of their own speech,” Smith’s testimony warns…
The hearing will begin at 10 AM in Russell Senate Office Building 301. Smith is scheduled to speak via livestream on the second panel, which will focus on the bill’s proposals related to political speech. The hearing will be livestreamed by the Committee here: https://www.rules.senate.gov/hearings/s1-the-for-the-people-act.
S. 1’s counterpart in the House, H.R. 1, passed in early March despite bipartisan opposition. All of the Institute’s analyses and resources related to both bills are available here.
Testimony of Bradley A. Smith Before the U.S. Senate Rules and Administration Committee on S. 1
S. 1 would impose onerous and unworkable standards on the ability of Americans and groups of Americans to discuss the policy issues of the day with elected officials and the public. It would radically transform oversight over the labyrinth of laws that regulate political speech from a historic, purposefully bipartisan system to one under partisan control. The proposal would coerce Americans into funding the campaigns of candidates with which they disagree under a system that research has proven hasn’t lived up to its goals elsewhere. As we struggle to emerge from the deaths and economic devastation of the pandemic, it’s likely most Americans would prefer to spend precious public funds addressing those harms. These issues represent only a few of the serious impacts on First Amendment freedoms that would be caused by enactment of S. 1.
At over 800 pages, S. 1 contains a hodgepodge of partially related and overlapping campaign finance provisions scattered in a number of different sections. Instead of consolidating and presenting these provisions in an organized, cohesive, and streamlined manner, the bill’s provisions are structured in a way that severely frustrates public understanding of legislative language that was already exceedingly vague and complex. This thoughtless, obfuscatory, and expedient approach to legislating, which is convenient only for the politicians pushing the bill, immediately belies its characterization as “For the People.”
Congress
Senate Rules & Administration Committee: S.1, THE FOR THE PEOPLE ACT
Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at 10:00 AM, Russell Senate Office Building 301
Witnesses, Panel II:
- Honorable Trevor Potter
Former Republican Chair of the FEC and Founder and President of Campaign Legal Center
Washington , DC
- Mr. Fred Wertheimer
Director of Democracy 21 and former President of Common Cause
Washington , DC
- Ms. Tiffany Muller
President and Executive Director of End Citizens United/Let America Vote Action Fund
Washington , DC
- Mr. Bradley Smith
Chairman of the Institute for Free Speech and former Republican Chair of the Federal Election Commission
Columbus , OH
- Honorable Lee Goodman
Former Republican Chair of the Federal Election Commission
Washington , DC
Washington Post: This is no time to compromise on democracy reform
By Lawrence Lessig
H.R. 1 is poised to be the most important democracy reform enacted by Congress since the Voting Rights Act of 1965. But in the wake of its passage in the House on a strict party-line vote on March 3, some anxious scholars and pundits worry it cannot pass the Senate and are urging Democrats to pull back.
That advice is wholly misguided, both politically and morally. This is not the time to compromise on H.R. 1. It is not time for Democrats to negotiate against themselves. This is the time to make the argument for every facet of H.R. 1 even more strongly.
Washington Post: The Technology 202: Where is YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki?
By Cat Zakrzewski
YouTube videos are a critical source of online misinformation, yet they often get a pass in broader discussions about the dangers of social media. Even in Congress.
YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has never had to appear alongside other social media executives for a Capitol Hill grilling, and she will not be in attendance on Thursday when Congress questions top tech executives for the first time since the Jan. 6 Capitol attacks.
Instead, lawmakers have invited Sundar Pichai, the CEO of YouTube’s parent companies Google and Alphabet, to testify alongside Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. All are becoming familiar figures at the Capitol. The hearing will be Zuckerberg’s fourth appearance since July and Dorsey and Pichai’s third during the same time period.
But YouTube critics say that by inviting Pichai, who has to answer for a broad range of different products and services at Alphabet, lawmakers are not paying enough specific attention to one of the most popular social networks in the world.
“There have been hearings where you can’t count on one hand the number of questions about YouTube, which is ridiculous given the level of impact,” said Evelyn Douek, a lecturer at Harvard Law School who researches online speech.
YouTube has the highest reach of any platform among American adults, with 73 percent of Americans reporting they use the platform in a 2019 Pew Research Center survey.
Events
Committee for Justice: H.R. 1, Election Fraud, and the Future of Voting
Mar 25, 2021 12:00 PM ET
At a time when half of Americans believe that there were substantial voting irregularities in November’s election, Democrats in the House have passed H.R. 1, a bill they say would protect voting rights but critics say would make it harder for states to determine voter eligibility and otherwise ensure election integrity. The bill contains a veritable wish list of progressives’ election-related “reforms,” also including felon voting, redistricting commissions, public financing of Congressional campaigns, and expanded regulation of political speech. Our panel of election law experts will discuss H.R. 1, its potential impact, possible alternatives, and what changes we’re likely to see in future elections.
Featuring:
-Bradley Smith
Chairman and Founder of the Institute for Free Speech
-Hans von Spakovsky
Manager of the Election Law Reform Initiative at the Heritage Foundation
-Jason Snead
Executive Director of the Honest Elections Project
-Curt Levey (moderator)
President of the Committee for Justice
Biden Administration
TK News by Matt Taibbi: A Biden Appointee’s Troubling Views On The First Amendment
By Matt Taibbi
When Columbia law professor Timothy Wu was appointed by Joe Biden to the National Economic Council a few weeks back, the press hailed it as great news for progressives…
Wu’s appointment may presage tougher enforcement of tech firms. However, he has other passions that got less ink. Specifically, Wu — who introduced the concept of “net neutrality” and once explained it to Stephen Colbert on a roller coaster — is among the intellectual leaders of a growing movement in Democratic circles to scale back the First Amendment. He wrote an influential September, 2017 article called “Is the First Amendment Obsolete?” that argues traditional speech freedoms need to be rethought in the Internet/Trump era. He outlined the same ideas in a 2018 Aspen Ideas Festival speech…
The Cliff’s Notes version of Wu’s thesis:
— The framers wrote the Bill of Rights in an atmosphere where speech was expensive and rare. The Internet made speech cheap, and human attention rare. Speech-hostile societies like Russia and China have already shown how to capitalize on this “cheap speech” era, eschewing censorship and bans in favor of “flooding” the Internet with pro-government propaganda.
— As a result, those who place faith in the First Amendment to solve speech dilemmas should “admit defeat” and imagine new solutions for repelling foreign propaganda, fake news, and other problems. “In some cases,” Wu writes, “this could mean that the First Amendment must broaden its own reach to encompass new techniques of speech control.” What might that look like? He writes, without irony: “I think the elected branches should be allowed, within reasonable limits, to try returning the country to the kind of media environment that prevailed in the 1950s.”
FEC
By Dave Levinthal
You have a family. You work two jobs to pay bills. You’re firmly part of the 75% percent — most definitely not the 1%.
And although you’re a well-connected political animal who has long engaged in local party politics, the notion of seeking elected office strikes you as silly. Where would you find time to run, short of quitting work? And if you did, how could you personally afford it?
A former Democratic congressional candidate filed a formal petition on Tuesday with the Federal Election Commission aimed at addressing this conundrum and helping “lower the barriers for working Americans to run for federal office.”
The petition, floated by 2020 congressional candidate Nabilah Islam, specifically asks the FEC to amend its regulations to:
- Allow congressional and presidential candidates to draw a salary from their campaign accounts for up to one year before a primary vote. Currently, candidates may only take a campaign-funded salary between a state’s candidate filing deadline and date of a primary vote, which varies from state to state and may only amount to a few weeks.
- Create a “salary floor” for candidates who pay themselves from their campaign account. Islam proposes setting that floor at “no less than the annualized salary of $15 per hour.”
- Grant campaign committees the right to pay their candidate’s health care insurance premiums and “permit a candidate to join any health benefit plan already provided to other campaign employees.”
Free Speech
Wall Street Journal: The Christian Baker Who Said ‘No’
By William McGurn
[Jack] Phillips owns Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colo., and holds traditional views on marriage and sexuality. The first legal action against him came via the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, when in 2012 he declined to bake a custom cake for a same-sex wedding and found himself accused of unlawful discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. This time he’s being sued because he wouldn’t bake a cake celebrating a gender transition…
Back in Lakewood, there is no shortage of other bakers happy to sell Ms. Scardina cakes with the messages she wants, [Kristen Waggoner, general counsel of the Alliance Defending Freedom] points out. But this won’t do. Because what Ms. Scardina really wants is not a cake. She wants to force Jack Phillips to express speech he objects to—or force him out of business if he doesn’t do it.
“Today it’s Jack,” Ms. Waggoner says. “Tomorrow it could be you.”
The States
Newsweek: Kentucky Bill Prompted by Breonna Taylor Protests on Hold Until 2022
By Mary Ellen Cagnassola
A controversial state bill, prompted by protests after the shooting death of Breonna Taylor by police last year in Louisville, will not make it to the Kentucky House floor this year after lawmakers failed to bring it up for vote last week.
Kentucky Senate Bill 211, sponsored by state Senator Danny Carroll, would in part make it a misdemeanor to “accost, insult, taunt, or challenge” police in public with the intent to provoke a violent response…
Carroll, a retired police officer, told Newsweek he would continue working with colleagues to redraft the bill and reintroduce it during the next session, which begins in January 2022.
“We made several changes to the bill while it was in the Senate and as a result were running short of time. The bill passed the Senate with not very many days remaining in the session itself,” Carroll said.
“When it got to the House, the members there—because of the controversial issue in this bill and the nature of this bill—I think the House members felt like they needed more time to study it.”
