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Project Veritas Action Fund (PVA) Appeared in the United States First Circuit Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to Challenge the Nations Broadest Recording LawSection 99 of Massachusetts Law. PVA Argued that Undercover Recordings are at the core of citizens First Amendment Rights.Massachusetts is the Only State in the Country to Outright Ban All Secret Audio Recordings.Eleven States have Found Ways to Respect Both the First Amendment and Privacy Concerns; PVA Expects the Same from the Massachusetts Legislature.The ACLUs Sister Lawsuit was Also the Subject of the District Court Judges Decree and Appeared in Court with PVA, Focusing its Arguments Solely in Favor of Secretly Recording Police Officers.

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(Boston, MA) Project Veritas Action Fund appeared in the US First Circuit Court of Appeals for the First Circuit yesterday to challenge Section 99 of Massachusetts law. This is a law that broadly restricts any sort of undercover recording.

PVA argues that, as a result of this law, the American public will miss out on newsworthy information derived from such recordings. Further, PVA states that Section 99 infringes on citizens First Amendment rights.

There are eleven states that believe it is the legislatures responsibility to provide some level of privacy protection in conversations, but Massachusetts is the only state to fully apply privacy protections without consideration for the citizens right to secretly record. PVA argued that Massachusetts, like those eleven states, should narrow its law.

PVA has asked the court to strike down the Section 99 law facially, that is to declare it entirely void. PVA wants the court to allow the Massachusetts legislature a chance to go back to the drafting table and write a new law that complies with the First Amendment.

According to PVAs attorney Ben Barrs observation of the oral argument, it appeared that all of the judges (including former US Supreme Court Associate Justice, David Souter) expressed real skepticism about the Constitutionality of the Massachusetts lawreferring to it as sweeping too broadly in several of their questions.

Ben Barr also observed that the specific line of questioning examines the states interest in securing privacy against the means the state employs to secure that privacy. In this case, an outright ban is simply too suppressive of speech and narrower tools could be used to protect truly private conversations.

In addition, the judges hinted that individuals were free to guard their own privacysuch as removing a discussion to a truly private placeinstead of needing a law that simply prohibits newsgathering of items disclosed in public.

Here are a few of the exchanges between PVA Attorney Ben Barr, Judge Barron, and Judge Selya:

Ben Barr: Massachusetts makes a mockery of the most effective form of newsgathering, undercover journalism, by denying citizens the right to be able to go out into public, and to be able to gather information in the most effective way possible, that is, secret audio recording.

Judge Barron: What do you mean by public?

Ben Barr: I mean a place in particular where there is no reasonable expectation of privacy. It brings me to the truly exceptional nature of Section 99.

Judge Barron: Just so I get it straight with the idea that everybody in this courtroom right now would have a First Amendment right to record these proceedings?

Ben Barr: Yes.

Judge Barron: Thats your position?

Ben Barr: Yes.

Judge Barron: Do you have a narrower position?

[laughter among those present]..

Judge Selya: Commonwealth has an interest in protecting the privacy of conversations. Everyone has some sort of right to the privacy of their conversations, full stop. And you can disagree with that as a matter of policy, but youve got to figure out why thats wrong as a matter of Constitutional law

Ben Barr: Primarily, it amounts to the tailoring and overbreadth issue, Judge Selya, while there is a legitimate governmental interest in protecting conversational privacy and 11 states have worked out test to do that. On the other end of the Constitutional equation is a right to be able to acquire information in public and report on that to the American people. So, being able to record a bribe occurring with a police officer on a

Judge Selya: But Massachusetts is talking not only about governmental privacy, theyre talking about the privacy of all participants in these conversations, which typically take place between a government official and a private citizen.

Ben Barr: Yes, and actually as was noted by Judge Barron earlier, it is entirely capable that government officials and individuals are able to safeguard their own privacy. If they have a confidential conversation, or an informant, theyre able meet in a private place. We are not alleging the right to be able to invade doctors offices or police stations

Judge Barron: Yeah, but you are saying that if I think that Ive taken precautions, that I sometimes might sit on a bench in the park and speak in what I think is in pretty confidential tones with someone else, and youre saying but Im at risk of someone having a recording device, and if I didnt notice it, that can then be sent all over the place, right?

Judge Selya: I want you to note that even in his hypotheticals, Judge Barron sees himself sitting on a bench.

(Laughter)

Judge Selya also addressed Massachusetts Assistant Attorney General, Eric Haskell:

Judge Selya to MA Assistant Attorney General Eric Haskell: Meeting with a confidential informant, if its done in public, whats wrong with that being recorded? If the police officer wants that meeting to be truly confidential, the police officer can control where the meeting is held. Easy enough to hold it in private.

Judge Selya to MA Assistant Attorney General Eric Haskell: Youre saying that if John Doe comes along, sees a police officer conversing with a politician, for example, they both have their backs turned to him, he holds out, in plain view of everybody, a tape recorder and turns it on, or a cell phone, and turns on the recording function, alright? They have their backs turned, but its in plain view to anyone who wants to walk. Everyone in the Boston Common sees it, except maybe the two people who were talking, and youre saying that is, or isnt, a violation of the statute?

The ACLU had a more limited vision of how to tackle the Massachusetts recording law.

Representing the ACLU was Jessie Rossman, who said that They focus exclusively on police officers, who, unlike other officials, are armed by the state and have the authority to take people into custody.

After the hearing, Ben Barr said:

We were pleased that the court held the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to accountability. This law is an outright ban on the most effective form of newsgatheringundercover journalismand deprives the public of important information. It is difficult to imagine it surviving todays review before the First Circuit.

If the First Amendment means anything, it means that citizens possess the power to hold accountable those in power. In 2020, using smartphones and digital recording devices to uncover political hypocrisy and self-dealing is the most effective means to do so and should be protected by the First Amendment.

Project Veritas Action Fund will never cease fighting for Americans Constitutional rights. It is imperative that individual citizens are allowed to perform their FirstAmendment right to report on public and private corruption. For many citizen journalists, undercover recording is the most effective way of delivering newsworthy facts to the public.

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Project Veritas Action Fund Defends Citizens' First Amendment Rights for Undercover Secret Recording in First Circuit Court of Appeals - Project...

Many people recoil at the notion that the First Amendment protects the speech that they most dislike or detest.

The late great Nat Hentoff captured this censorial impulse in his Free Speech for Me, But Not for Thee.

But the reality is that the First Amendment protects much speech that is obnoxious, offensive and repugnant.

Justice William Brennan captured this principle eloquently in his majority opinion in the flag-burning decision Texas v. Johnson (1989):

If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.

The case involved the protest activities of Gregory Lee Johnson, who burned an American flag in 1984 in Dallas, the site of the Republican National Convention. While Johnson doused the flag with kerosene, others chanted, America, red, white and blue, we spit on you.

Johnson and others protested the policies of the Reagan administration and a coming second term for the president.

Of all the protesters, authorities arrested only Johnson and charged him with violating a Texas flag desecration law.

The court decided the case by the narrowest of margins, 5-4. Brennan emphasized that the state of Texas essentially was punishing Johnson for his dissident political views more than tarnishing a venerated object.

The way to preserve the flags special role is not to punish those who feel differently about these matters, Brennan wrote. It is to persuade them they are wrong.

In dissent, Chief Justice William Rehnquist analogized Johnsons burning of the flag to fighting words. But, in this case, Brennans view prevailed.

A lasting legacy of Brennans opinion in Texas v. Johnson is his bedrock principle phrase, which has come to represent a cardinal principle of First Amendment law that the First Amendment protects much offensive expression.

David L. Hudson Jr. is a First Amendment Fellow at the Freedom Forum Institute and a law professor at Belmont University.

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David L. Hudson Jr. | The 'bedrock principle' of the First Amendment - TribDem.com

Posted: Jan 9, 2020 / 02:24 PM EST / Updated: Jan 9, 2020 / 02:24 PM EST

WASHINGTON, D.C. (RTDNF) TheRadio Television Digital News Foundationhas announced the winners of the30thannual First Amendment Awards. The distinguished group of honorees represent the valuable role journalists play in local and national media to practice the First Amendment. A total of 7 awards will be given in 2020 and the honorees will join115 previous winnerswho championed a vital part of our democracy.

The 2020 honorees are:

As the RTDNF Board of Trustees discussed the candidates, there was overwhelming support for the accomplishments and the impact our 2020 honorees have made to journalism, stated RTDNF chairman and vice president of local content development for Nexstar Broadcasting Jerry Walsh. This years honorees are a mix of local and network journalists that provide illuminating reporting, a respected national news program which holds the powerful accountable and a visionary who defends the publics right to know.

Each honoree will be awarded at the First Amendment Awards Dinner & Show onMarch 5, 2020at the Marriott Marquis inWashington, DC. Sponsorships and tickets are available now atwww.firstamendmentawards.org. The event draws some 500 of the biggest names in broadcast and digital journalism. Additional information on the winners will be announced in the coming weeks.

Every day journalists and news professionals are working hard to keep the publics trust through truthful reporting, more transparency and responsible journalism that often serves as a catalyst for positive change, saidDan Shelley, executive director of RTDNA/RTDNF. These awards allow us to honor the efforts of all journalism professionals, and shine a light on those companies, individuals and political figures who publicly champion journalism and journalists as essential to democracy.

In addition to recognizing responsible journalism, the First Amendment Awards Dinner & Show is the Foundations biggest annual fundraiser, enabling the Foundation to ensure that the broadcast and digital news profession remains a critical part of our nations free press for generations to come and supporting scholarships for journalism students.

Read Steve Andrews investigations:

SOURCE Radio Television Digital News Foundation

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Investigator Steve Andrews honored with RTDNF Lifetime Achievement Award - WFLA

Jonathan Reisman, an associate professor of economics andpublic policy at the University of Maine at Machias, is appealing his case, Reisman v. Associated Faculties of theUniversity of Maine (AFUM), to the U.S. Supreme Court.

On Friday, Jan. 2, The Buckeye Institute, the organization representing Reisman in his case, filed an appeal to SCOTUS calling for an end to laws in Maine and other states that force public-sector employees to accept compelled union representation. This process, called exclusive representation (a policy for which unions advocate), prevents nonmember employees in a bargaining unit from representing themselves in matters with their employer.

In 2018, the high court ruled in Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) that public employees cannot be required to pay dues or fees to a labor union as a condition of employment. Before Janus, nonmember public employees were compelled to pay agency fees to a union for the cost of the organizations representational activities concerning the employee, despite rejecting the unions representation by refusing to join or opting out of membership.

SCOTUS ruled this practice violates the First Amendment rights of public employees. Reisman is asking the high court to consider exclusive representation laws under the same principle. If compelled payments to a union violate a public employees First Amendment rights, compelled representation must also violate employees rights.

Professor Reisman is a hardworking public employee who has for many years been forced to associate with a union with which he disagrees and suffer it to speak for him,saidRobert Alt, president and chief executive officer ofThe Buckeye Instituteand a lead attorney on the case. If state law cannot compel public employees to financially support union advocacy as the court ruled inJanus v. AFSCME how can states require these same public employees to accept representation from unions that many of them have chosen not to join? These are serious questions about the constitutionality of exclusive representation questions which the U.S. Supreme Court needs to address.

Despite resigning hisunion membership, Professor Reisman is required by Maine law be represented bya union with which he does not agree and of which he is not amember,saidAndrew M. Grossman, a partner at BakerHostetler in Washington,D.C., and counsel of record on theReisman v. AFUMpetition.Following the Courts landmarkJanusruling, it is clearthat these laws are unconstitutional, and we hope the Court will recognize themas such.

Reisman formerly served as a grievance officer with hisunion before resigning his membership after the Janus decision. His former union, AFUM, is affiliated with theMaine Education Association and the National Education Association, which hastaken political stances that Reisman finds objectionable.

While the outcome of Janus freed him from the requirement ofeither joining the union or being forced to pay representation fees, Maine lawstill forces AFUM to be Reismans exclusive representative, meaning he is stillassociated with the positions the union takes.

If the Supreme Court agrees to hear Reismans case and rules in his favor, the First Amendment rights of public employees to represent themselves in matters with their employer would be restored. The end result is true freedom of speech and association, not compelled speech and association as required by state labor law.

The Buckeye Institute is also representing public employees in other post-Janus lawsuits throughout the country, including Kathy Uradnik of St. Cloud State University in Uradnik v. Inter Faculty Organization and Jade Thompson, a Spanish teacher in Ohio, in Thompson v. Marietta Education Association.

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Maine professor suing faculty union appeals his case to the Supreme Court - The Maine Wire

Gene Policinski

By GENE POLICINSKI

At years end, First Amendment issues are as controversial and multi-faceted as anything in our fractured, divided society.

The least-recognized of the amendments five freedoms assembly and petition are facing perhaps the most-immediate challenges,though freedoms of press, speech and religion dont escape unscathed.

Most immediately, a Black Lives Matter activist faces a lawsuit from a Baton Rouge, La., police officer who blamed the activist for injuries he suffered at a 2016 protest over the police killing of a black man. The suit doesnt claim the activist threw or even encouraged the throwing of a rock; rather, it seeks damages because the man led others to block a highway where the violent incident occurred.

A recentWashington Poststory notes that Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) plans to introduce legislation to hold protesters arrested during unpermitted demonstrations liable for police overtime and other fees around such demonstrations.

In more than a dozen states in recent years, from Oregon to Florida, lawmakers have faced proposals to increase penalties for obstructing streets and highways and to limit the financial liability of drivers whose cars injure protesters. In Arizona, a failed 2017 proposal rooted in that states racketeering laws would have permitted the arrest and seizure of homes and other assets of those whom simply plan a protest in which some act of violence occurs.

In a similar financial penalty vein, several major news operations face defamation lawsuits seeking massive damages over their coverage of news events claims certain to roil public debate once again about the role, credibility and performance of the nations free press. Critics also say such lawsuits even if unlikely to succeed are effectively attempts to chill reporting and intimidate corporate owners.

Prominent among those filing the lawsuits is Rep. Devin Nunes, (R-Calif.), whowants $435 million dollars from CNNfor a report he says falsely linked him to events in the ongoing Ukraine-Biden investigation controversy. He also is seeking $150 million fromTheFresno Beeover a report involving a workplace scandal at a winery in which Nuneshas a stake, $75 million from Hearst over anEsquirearticle regarding a family farm in Iowa, with the claim the magazine has an axe to grind against him and a $250 million lawsuit against Twitter for what he says is its intentional effort to downplay conservative content as well as two parody accounts that mock him.

In the introduction to the most recent lawsuit, Nunes says CNN is the mother of fake news. It is the least trusted name. CNN is eroding the fabric of America, proselytizing, sowing distrust and disharmony. It must be held accountable.

Moving to another area of contention, campus free speech issues continue to vex collegiate communities, from complaints that conservative speech and views of faculty and staff are stifled, to a move by President Trump that he says will fight against anti-Semitism but that critics say is really intended to punish student or faculty advocacy for the BDS Movement boycotts, divestiture or sanctions aimed at ending international support for Israel.

Much like the campus controversies, interpretations of religious liberty regarding public policy continued to swirl through the year. As the Supreme Courts 2019-20 term began in October, at least eight cases touching on faith issues the most in recent years were scheduled to be heard. A number involved LGBTQ rights regarding employment or health benefits. While some cases do not directly involve religious organizations, the courts decisions would affect arguments over whether religious beliefs can negate claims of discrimination on the basis of sexual preference.

An expansion of First Amendment protection for commercial speech (which at one time did not exist in law) continues, as courts at least give serious consideration to a variety of business arguments. In several instances, corporate lawyers are arguing that to force companies to make certain disclosures about product content or sources is an unacceptable requirement that violates the First Amendment by forcing companies to speak.

Other cases involve claims of free speech protection for hospitals facing a Trump administration rule requiring disclosure of secret rates. Industry groups filed a lawsuit earlier this month, also claiming it is compelled speech in violation of the First Amendment.

New technology continues inexorably to challenge long-standing law. In a mix of free speech and public safety concerns, a Texas man was sentenced in February to eight years in prison for using a 3-D printer to construct a plastic handgun and ammunition in violation of a prior court order against owning of a firearm. Advocates for the so-called 3-D gun argue the computer instructions in such 3-D printing projects are speech and not subject to federal or state firearms regulations. Government officials say existing criminal law on issues such as possession and manufacturing should allow them to regulate or ban making or owning such weapons.

Government officials and social media critics continue to hammer operations such as Facebook and Twitter which are not government entities, but private concerns not governed by the First Amendment with regulatory threats over political advertising, hate speech and evidence of foreign election interference.

Threatened action ranges from using anti-trust legislation to break up the largest social media companies, to removal of what is known as Section 230 protection for companies (from the Communications Decency Act of 1996) that now permits them to avoid legal responsibility for content they simply carry, rather than material they create or significantly edit.

Opponents of watering down or removing Section 230 protection say either action would, in effect, end the web as we know it by shutting down the flow of information to the mere trickle of items or articles that could be independently verified by internet providers, or to bland factual accounts devoid of opinion or interpretation.

The year 2019 may well go down in First Amendment history as a turning point, in which those working to limit or control information avoided direct confrontations over First Amendment rights and turned to tactics designed to make it much more difficult, much too costly or even financially ruinous to exercise those rights.

Gene Policinski is president and chief operating officer of the Freedom Forum Institute. He can be reached at[emailprotected], or follow him on Twitter at@genefac.

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First Five: We're divided in new ways over 1st Amendment Posted Dec 28, 2019 - Salina Post