Incitement to violence is not protected free speech but the president has no authority to unilaterally decide that all or even most instances of flag burning constitute incitement. That would also be defying binding precedent, which is what it sounds like they intend to do.

"We took freedom of speech away" should be in every campaign ad moving forward.

SORTOR: I took this flag from the man that was burning it in the street TRUMP: Do you know who he is? SORTOR: Oh yeah TRUMP: So why don't you give it to Pam. Give it to the attorney general and we'll start prosecutions

New from me at The Dispatch: DHS says it's illegal to videotape ICE agents. That's not what the courts say. @thedispatchmedia.bsky.social

Got a tip recently about how Trump's tariffs are preventing libraries from sharing books, and causing their loaned books to get stuck or lost in other countries: www.404media.co/libraries-ca...

from a purely economic standpoint, thats a 46% return on investment. literally wasting money by not doing it!!!

So now we have court filings in which cases are allegedly hallucinated by *check notes* LEXIS NEXIS, THE EFFING LARGEST, MOST USED LEGAL DATABASE BY LAWYERS, COURTS, AND LEGAL SCHOLARS. Seems bad.

FBI Director Kash Patel reportedly fired an agent trainee on Wednesday for displaying a pride flag on his desk while working in a field office in California last year.

🧵 In 2025, book censorship in the United States is rampant and common. Never before in the life of any living American have so many books been systematically removed from school libraries across the country.

As @genevievelakier.bsky.social notes, this scheme is squarely unconstitutional under existing cases. There's some tricky nuance in the doctrine, but the thrust is that the government may not condition receipt of federal funds on ideological agreement with the government (or on refusing to speak).

The Saudi government murdered Jamal Khashoggi seven years ago today. His editor @karenattiah.bsky.social wrote this two years ago.

🧵 In 2025, book censorship in the United States is rampant and common. Never before in the life of any living American have so many books been systematically removed from school libraries across the country. Read our new report "The Normalization of Book Banning" at: pen.org/report/the-n...

BREAKING: Judge William Young, a Reagan appointee, delivers the most scathing legal rebuke of the Trump era, ruling that Trump and his cabinet illegally targeted pro-Palestinian students for deportation to "strike fear" into First Amendment protesters. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Kansas passed a law making it illegal for hospitals (or any employer) to require COVID vaccination unless they grant a religious exemption -- with no inquiry into the sincerity of those who claim it. Basically, employers must allow automatic exemptions. (h/t @doritreiss.bsky.social). /1

Somebody should do this about some CT town where everybody is Italian lol.

The curator of a museum exhibition in Thailand that criticized authoritarian governments in China, Myanmar and other countries fled to London, fearing arrest after Chinese and Thai officials pressured the museum to remove the names of artists whose works criticized China.

As I was saying…

They want stenographers, not journalists.

The Daily Show will go down swinging. Tonight’s guest- Maria Ressa, Nobel Laureate and author of How to Stand Up to a Dictator.

“'This is all feeling awfully like home,' a friend of mine from Russia texted me yesterday evening. And so it is. This combination of public and private pressure is the hallmark of the modern dictatorship. Why use thugs in the street when you can just threaten people’s livelihoods?"

Few companies rely on—and benefit from—our constitutional freedoms as much as media empires like Disney and Paramount. It’s astonishing to see them trading away their freedoms and ours for short-term profits.

Disney learned nothing from Andor.

Don't want to say I called it, but... you know... sometimes I know what I'm talking about. www.techdirt.com/2024/11/27/b...

Carr gives up the game.

It’s a critical moment to step up and fight back against government overreach in media. If you’re a publisher who needs legal support, please let me know if I can help connect to resources to stand up to viewpoint-based government bullying

There's not meaningful freedom of speech without institutions willing to promote and implement that freedom. On one hand, private media entities have broad editorial discretion under 1A doctrine. On the other, it's bad for *everyone's* freedom if that discretion is exercised to please the state.

Not really an overstatement to say that the test of a free society is whether or not comedians can make fun of the country's leader on TV without repurcussions.

The Trump administration is echoing the National Endowment for the Arts' history of censoring projects that the government dislikes, like ones with LGBTQ themes. Just as we did in the '90s, we're suing to protect artistic freedom.

President Donald Trump on Sunday threatened to investigate Chris Christie over a decade-old political scandal and revoke ABC News’ broadcasting license after the Disney-owned network aired an interview in which the former governor sharply criticized the president.

So, like, even if there hadn't been two Supreme Court decisons in living memory directly holding that flag burning is protected under the First Amendment, *new criminal laws cannot be created by executive order.*

The Trump administration's detention of Mario Guevara sends "a chilling message to journalists who weren’t born in the United States: abandon news reporting, particularly on ICE, or you could be next," @kgosztola.bsky.social writes.

🚨Journalism job alert🚨 We're hiring an investigative reporter to join my team at @wired.com. We're looking for someone who has both traditional and non-traditional reporting skills (coding/data work/OSINT, etc). Fit the bill? Come work with me! condenast.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/CondeCareers...

I just posted Ipse Dixit #827, featuring @billchilds.bsky.social of Bowman and Brooks & Mitchell Hamline Law discussing his new "amusement park law" casebook "Recreation & Risk" from Carolina Academic Press. shows.acast.com/ipse-dixit/e...

Our work protecting journalists and whistleblowers depends on you. At a time like this, your help is vital. Here’s what you can do: - Sign up for our newsletters: freedom.press/newsletters/ - Donate now: freedom.press/donate

LAPD lies about attack on reporters Read more in our weekly newsletter (and subscribe):

Liza Goitein of @brennancenter.org details the law around the use of the National Guard in D.C. (Her long threads are always excellent.)

Missouri attorney general Andrew Bailey, newly tapped by the Trump administration as deputy director of the FBI, has taken actions calculated to chill free speech while stretching beyond all legal logic to defend the interests of Donald Trump. A few highlights: /1

EJ Antoni, Trump's nominee to be director of BLS, was a full-fledged participant in the storming of the US Capitol on Jan 6, reports Wired. But he escaped being identified and criminally charged at the time. www.wired.com/story/twitte...

NEWS: The Fifth Circuit today reversed Judge Matt Kacsmaryk's ruling allowing West Texas A&M's president to ban a charity drag show on campus. Today, Judge Leslie Southwick, a GWB appointee, wrote the opinion reversing Kacsmaryk. Background at Law Dork: www.lawdork.com/p/university...

JUST IN: Blistering ruling by Judge Ho on ICE arrests in immigration court. He says the Trump administration has turned attendance at immigration court proceedings into a game of "detention roulette" that violates due process. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Wow: this decision in favor of Media Matters includes all sorts of key details concerning the Trump admin’s coordinated assault on the First Amendment. For example: Steven Miller “seemingly” ordered Attorneys General in Missouri and Texas to go after MM. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Covid deniers and vaccine deniers bear some responsibility for this attrocity.

We're well over the 50 incidents documented in our investigation now. Here's one from this week from @opb.org, reporting that a young girl was also in the the van of Mam-speaking farmworkers from Guatemala when immigration agents broke the driver window. www.opb.org/article/2025...

"Delays in interview appointments, increased documentation checks, and a sharp rise in rejection rates have created a cloud of uncertainty over the entire higher education system." www.m9.news/usa-news/us-...

I had not heard about this case - it’s beyond absurd. Worse than even the most hysterical censorship after 9/11, I think.

I am horrified. If you use US material, download all old reports you use. The record will be erased. Even that might not save you: every report sourced from the US will now have to be suspected of politicised manipulation and will in the future the same credibility as Iran’s human rights reports

I talked to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker about Secret Service agents reading through my reporter's notebook:

That’s good. But I’ll believe it when I see it. Will sunlight help with the BLS?

The Columbia settlement is an “astonishing transfer of autonomy and authority to . . . an administration whose disdain for the values of the academy is demonstrated anew every day.” New @knightcolumbia.org analysis of the Columbia settlement, just published. knightcolumbia.org/blog/what-th...