On the cold-blooded execution of alleged drug smugglers. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Defending the speech rights of those with whom you disagree can come around to help you. Not doing so can come around to haunt you. Glad we had the oppty to defend NRA’s speech rights in SCOTUS — and that it’s helping fight back agst Trump now. reason.com/volokh/2025/...

I joined Tavis Smiley to discuss flagburning, why the First Amendment protects it, and why Trump just doesn’t get it. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/d...

Thanks Elizabeth. And I recommend anything by Elizabeth about how we are endangering the life our our planet, but especially the Sixth Extinction.

Donald Trump’s recent executive order against flag-burning will not only encourage more of it, @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social argues, but “could also hand flag-burners a legal defense in the rare situation when they might otherwise be prosecuted”:

I represented the flag burners who established the First Amendment right. My take on Trump’s flag burning EO. All Smoke, No Fire

I asked @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social what he thought of the Presidential Immunity SCOTUS decision. He gave a nuanced answer which showed the Conservative Justices to be tragically naive about Donald Trump bit.ly/Click-2-Listen YouTube youtu.be/NlkRDE0M9SQ

The big question: Will DonaldTrump follow court orders from SCOTUS? There is a small ray of hope on that front. But will it last? @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social explains. bit.ly/Click-2-Listen YouTube youtu.be/NlkRDE0M9SQ

@davidcole-gtown.bsky.social has a message for folks who fight Trump's authoritarianism. You are the heroes that will be remembered. And acknowledges the real courage it takes to defy Donald Trump. bit.ly/Click-2-Listen YouTube youtu.be/NlkRDE0M9SQ

I spoke with Bill Press on his podcast about the Trump Injustice Dept, Trump's attack on civil society, and how we must respond. billpresspods.com/listen-now

And here’s a recent report on the fantastic work they do in appellate courts across the country. perma.cc/27AN-49J7

Georgetown Civil Rights Appellate Clinic is hiring! This is a fabulous opportunity to work with one of the best appellate civil rights lawyers today, Brian Wolfman. perma.cc/CX9E-NSEJ

Our 8/21 issue is now online, with @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on the Supreme Court’s scorn for precedent, Henry Louis Gates Jr. on Jamaica Kincaid’, @seanmcarroll.bsky.social on cosmic timing, poems by John Berryman & @joriegraham.bsky.social, and more.

So much for calling balls and strikes. How the Court’s conservatives changed the rules in their most important cases this term when following the rules would lead to a liberal result.

The @aclu.org is usually defending minority rights; but right now on immigration, they're representing a great majority – 62% of Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of immigration: @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social comments – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/46Lw8Ao @aclusocal.bsky.social

David Pozen on the troubling process (or lack thereof)behind the Columbia settlement. balkin.blogspot.com/2025/07/regu...

Why the courts are likely to strike down Trump's executive order to end birthright citizenship – the 14th Amendment explicitly grants citizenship to those born in the US – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/46Lw8Ao

Trump OCR report on alleged antisemitic discrimination at Harvard is so flimsy it suggests, maybe, he's going after Harvard for something else? My analysis of a deeply flawed report. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Many thanks to @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social for nominating @demandtimpossible.bsky.social as one of 2024’s top reads. @georgetownlaw.bsky.social bit.ly/4jENbHk

In honor of Pride Month, this week we revisit an episode with @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social about the Supreme Court ruling on Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibited discrimination against LGBTQ+ people on the basis of sexual orientation. Listen here: tinyurl.com/DavidColeACLU

Here’s what happened when I got called to testify on antisemitism on collegee campus. It was the eighth such hearing, and like any reality show that has gone on too long, it quickly jumped the shark. www.thenation.com/article/soci...

the closest precedent for these hearings was HUAC. It also targeted academia because it deemed it too liberal. And it, too, was not interested in the facts or the law, but in shaming witnesses, chilling speech, and grabbing headlines for partisan gain. www.thenation.com/article/soci...

Here’s what happened when I got called to testify on antisemitism on collegee campus. It was the eighth such hearing, and like any reality show that has gone on too long, it quickly jumped the shark. www.thenation.com/article/soci...

Devastating. The cowardice and the betrayal of an incomparable news brand.

Free Speech on Campus: "We are a country that should be strong enough to tolerate open expression of views... the answer to our discomfort with it is not to file a complaint and suppress speech" – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on 'Living in the USA' @kpfk.bsky.social bit.ly/4j42mt5

"The kind of conflation of biased speech with discrimination, which is what's going on in this House Committee every time they hold a hearing, is really unsupported by the law." – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4mfzl0j

"The Supreme Court has protected the rights of Nazis to march in Skokie, can’t get much more anti-Semitic than that." – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on why slogans like "From the river to the sea" are protected by the 1st Amendment – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4mfzl0j

David Cole @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social recently testified before the House Committee on Education, which, "treated any criticism of Israel or Zionism as necessarily anti-Semitic" when, "it’s not necessarily anti-Semitic" – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4mfzl0j

"The Supreme Court has protected the rights of Nazis to march in Skokie, can't get much more anti-Semitic than that" – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on why universities must resist Elise Stefanik – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4mfzl0j

On the House Committee on Education: "Not a single member of the committee ever conflated criticism of Hamas with Islamophobia, although they basically all conflate criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism." – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4mfzl0j

@davidcole-gtown.bsky.social Excellent testimony. Thank you for pointing out the parallels to McCarthyism and the House Republicans’ cynical use of antisemitism to strip away free speech rights www.highereddive.com/news/republi...

A little clip on academic freedom from my testimony before HUAC, otherwise known as the House Committee on Education and Workforce.

Don’t be fooled by the Trump assault on DEI. DEI and race-based initiatives in medicine remain as necessary and as lawful as ever. jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

On the continuum between evading and defying law, where Trump is, and where he may be going. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Will Trump cross the constitutional redline and defy the courts? Has he already? And what will be the consequences? I address these questions in my latest for NYRB. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

“It is one thing to shoplift surreptitiously and another to walk into a store and openly take its merchandise, brazenly asserting that no law can stop you.” My latest on Trump’s response to the federal courts — and their response to him www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Will Trump cross the constitutional redline and defy the courts? Has he already? And what will be the consequences? I address these questions in my latest for NYRB. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Two fine men, agreeing to lock up an innocent man. This is what we have come to. Will the courts continue to push back? My latest in @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Exactly. This is a wartime authority. We are not at war. And certainly not with Tren de Aragua, a group most Americans never even heard of until Trump declared them an invading enemy nation.

BREAKING: A Trump-appointed judge has barred the administation from removing migrants under the Alien Enemies Act, saying Trump's invocation of that law in the context of Tren de Aragua was illegal. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

“being Donald Trump apparently means never being able to say you’re sorry” Has he ever? My latest on Trump, Abrego Garcia, the Venezuelans, and the courts. www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

“It is one thing to shoplift surreptitiously and another to walk into a store and openly take its merchandise, brazenly asserting that no law can stop you.” My latest on Trump’s response to the federal courts — and their response to him www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

The amazing @rtushnet.bsky.social @evelyndouek.bsky.social @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social , Erwin Chemerinsky, Geof Stone, Robert Post, Nadine Strossen and Amanda Shanor joined the brief with me. The bottom line: the admin's actions are flagrantly and obviously unconstitutional....

Harvard's defiant reaction to Trump's "grotesquely unconstitutional" "hostile takeover" letter to the university "reflects the power of people, the power of activism." @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4lz3cAx

"Universities have the right to decide what they teach, who teaches, who is admitted, and how they organize and govern student life on campus." – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on Trump vs. @harvard.edu – on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4lz3cAx

“giving in to a mob boss is the beginning, not the end, of one’s servitude.” www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Trump vs. Harvard: Government does not have the right to use funding "as leverage to try to intrude on the institutional autonomy of the university, and that's exactly what Trump is seeking to do here"— @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4lz3cAx @aaup.bsky.social

"Too many university leaders are still keeping their heads down, evidently hoping that if they do not speak up Trump will not target them." www.nybooks.com/online/2025/... @nybooks.com @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social

On Trump's "grotesquely unconstitutional" demands of Harvard University; "not a single judge, even going up to the Supreme Court, would say that this letter is constitutional, not even Justice Thomas" – @davidcole-gtown.bsky.social on @thenation.com podcast bit.ly/4lz3cAx

"The very idea of a free university cannot coexist with the ideological micromanagement Trump sought to impose." www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...