Tag: 1st amendment

Michigander Who Allegedly Told Cops He Wanted To ‘Blow Up’ Satanic Temple Indicted On Explosives Charges

A Michigan man who allegedly revealed he had explosive devices because he wanted to blow up The Satanic Temple (TST) in Massachusetts last year faced explosives-related charges Wednesday, according to federal prosecutors.

Luke Isaac Terpstra, 30, of Grant, Michigan, “has been charged with transporting an explosive with the intent to kill, injure, or intimidate individuals or to unlawfully damage or destroy a building,” according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Michigan. Terpstra was also separately charged with illegally possessing a destructive device, according to the statement.

Terpstra built several improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and transported them together with some firearms and ammunition from Michigan to the TST location in Salem, Massachusetts in Sept. 2023 with a self-professed intention to “blow up” the temple, prosecutors alleged in the statement.

Michigan’s Grant Police Department arrested Terpstra Jan. 2 following an investigation and charged him with Explosives — Possession of Bombs with Unlawful Intent, according to a mid-January joint statement by Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo and Salem Police Chief Lucas Miller. He appeared to have visited Salem to plan the attack but did not seem to have contacts in Salem, the joint statement observed.

The arresting officers found Terpstra with IED-making materials such as “a plastic container with coins attached to it and a piece of cannon fuse coming out of the lid; numerous metal carbon dioxide (CO2) cartridges; PVC pipe; ammonium nitrate; and hobby fuses,” according to the prosecutors’ statement.

Terpstra’s mother and stepfather aided the investigation, according to WZZM 13.

Keep reading

Even If You Support Police, Don’t Ban People From Recording Them


Police, questioned over tactics and culturally besieged not too long ago, find themselves with renewed cachet amidst concerns over crime and campus chaos. That means leverage to win themselves leeway in how they go about their jobs—pushing, for instance, laws that restrict the public’s right to record cops making arrests, with Florida the latest jurisdiction to enact such a bill. That pleases fans of law enforcement, but it reduces accountability for an armed and often abusive arm of government.

Florida Proudly Supports Police Unaccountability

“I was proud to sign legislation today to ensure law enforcement officers can serve our communities without worrying about harassment from anti-police activists,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced April 12. “We will continue to take action to ensure Florida remains the friendliest state in the nation for law enforcement officers.”

The two bills DeSantis signed that day certainly go a long way towards making the state very friendly to cops. H.B. 601 guarantees that police departments will control oversight boards that investigate their conduct. S.B. 184, in line with “buffer” legislation in other states intended to impede recording of law-enforcement activity, lets police order members of the public to remain at least 25 feet distant under threat of arrest.

“We appreciate the importance of protecting first responders but are concerned that the bill prevents citizens from going near or filming first responders within 25 feet if told not to approach,” noted the state’s First Amendment Foundation, which urged DeSantis to veto the legislation. “This bill would undermine citizen journalists and could allow for undocumented police misconduct.”

Lawmakers and DeSantis made much of the threat posed by citizens who “harass” and “threaten” police, and indeed we’ve seen some of that at anti-Israel protests around the country. But agitators already blocking bridges or occupying buildings are unlikely to be deterred by yet one more law. The real targets will be people upsetting cops by recording them at inconvenient moments.

Keep reading

This Student Was Allegedly Suspended for Saying ‘Illegal Aliens.’ Did That Violate the First Amendment?

A 16-year-old boy has kicked off a free speech debate—one that’s already attracting spectators beyond his North Carolina county—after he was suspended for allegedly “making a racially insensitive remark that caused a class disturbance.”

The racially insensitive remark: referring to undocumented immigrants as “illegal aliens.” Invoking that term would produce the beginning of a legal odyssey, still in its nascent stages, in the form of a federal lawsuit arguing that Central Davidson High School Assistant Principal Eric Anderson violated Christian McGhee’s free speech rights for temporarily barring him from class over a dispute about offensive language.

What constitutes offensive speech, of course, depends on who is evaluating. During an April English lesson, McGhee says he sought clarification on a vocabulary word: aliens. “Like space aliens,” he asked, “or illegal aliens without green cards?” In response, a Hispanic student—another minor whom the lawsuit references under the pseudonym “R.”—reportedly joked that he would “kick [McGhee’s] ass.” 

The exchange prompted a meeting with Anderson, the assistant principal. “Mr. Anderson would later recall telling [McGhee] that it would have been more ‘respectful’ for [McGhee] to phrase his question by referring to ‘those people’ who ‘need a green card,'” McGhee’s complaint notes. “[McGhee] and R. have a good relationship. R. confided in [McGhee] that he was not ‘crying’ in his meeting with Anderson”—the principal allegedly claimed R. was indeed in tears over the exchange—”nor was he ‘upset’ or ‘offended’ by [McGhee’s] question. R. said, ‘If anyone is racist, it is [Mr. Anderson] since he asked me why my Spanish grade is so low’—an apparent reference to R.’s ethnicity.”

McGhee’s peer received a short in-school suspension, while McGhee was barred from campus for three days. He was not permitted an appeal, per the school district’s policy, which forecloses that avenue if a suspension is less than 10 days. And while a three-day suspension probably doesn’t sound like it would induce the sky to fall, McGhee’s suit notes that he hopes to secure an athletic scholarship for college, which may now be in jeopardy.

So the question of the hour: If the facts are as McGhee construed them, did Anderson violate the 16-year-old’s First Amendment rights? In terms of case law, the answer is a little more nebulous than you might expect. But it still seems that vindication is a likely outcome (and, at least in my opinion, rightfully so). 

Keep reading

Backpage: A Blueprint for Squelching Speech

U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa acquitted three former Backpage executives of myriad counts against them last week—more evidence of how empty so much of the federal case against them is. Humetewa ruled that there was insufficient evidence to uphold 50 of the counts* against journalist and Backpage co-founder Michael Lacey, 10 of the counts against former Executive Vice President Scott Spear, and 18 of the counts against former Chief Financial Officer Jed Brunst.

From the beginning, this prosecution has been premised on a bogus rationale (authorities yammer on about sex trafficking though none of the defendants are charged with sex trafficking), overreaching in its scope (attempting to hold a web platform accountable for user-generated speech, in contradiction to Section 230), offensive to the First Amendment, and relentless in its attempts to handicap the defense. So it’s a treat to see a judge slap prosecutors down a notch, even if it comes very late in the game (after two trials and after one defendant taking his own life) and even though it may not make much of a practical difference for Lacey, Brunst, and Spear (who face imprisonment for the rest of their lives even with the acquittals).

But to read Humetewa’s recent order is to get infuriated about the underlying case all over again. Presenting the evidence in the light most favorable to the government’s position, Humetewa manages (inadvertently?) to highlight how insane and unfair this position is.

Keep reading

US House Passes Controversial Bill That Expands Definition of Anti-Semitism

The United States House of Representatives has overwhelmingly passed a bill that would expand the federal definition of anti-Semitism, despite opposition from civil liberties groups.

The bill passed the House on Wednesday by a margin of 320 to 91, and it is largely seen as a reaction to the ongoing antiwar protests unfolding on US university campuses. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.

If the bill were to become law, it would codify a definition of anti-Semitism created by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

That is a federal anti-discrimination law that bars discrimination based on shared ancestry, ethnic characteristics or national origin. Adding IHRA’s definition to the law would allow the federal Department of Education to restrict funding and other resources to campuses perceived as tolerating anti-Semitism.

But critics warn IHRA’s definition could be used to stifle campus protests against Israel’s war in Gaza, which has claimed the lives of 34,568 Palestinians so far.

Keep reading

Not in Our Name

Free speech is not a divisible concept. Either everyone is free to say what they want, no matter how noxious others find it, in order to create and sustain the free market of ideas—or else speech isn’t free.

Institutions that curtail speech—that make people’s social media postings grounds for expulsion, that ban or suppress speakers they disagree with, that penalize dissenting opinions in classrooms and workplaces with bad grades and HR reports—should not be allowed to then turn around and invoke the principles of free speech to defend problematic speech with which they happen to agree, let alone disruptive or illegal behavior.

And yet, recent years have seen the emergence of two different speech regimes, one for alleged oppressors and one for the allegedly oppressed. Huge swaths of often innocent speech by the former is deemed out of bounds, even criminal, whereas any speech coming out of the mouth of someone with a claim to victim status—including speech that actively incites violence—is considered sacrosanct.

As a result, there is now a great deal of confusion about freedom of speech, which is a very basic—and very central—principle of American history and society. For those interested in being de-confused, which we humbly submit should be all thinking American citizens, herewith: a primer.

Keep reading

Journalism Is Not a Crime, Even When It Offends the Government

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been imprisoned in London for five years, while Texas journalist Priscilla Villarreal was only briefly detained at the Webb County Jail. But both were arrested for publishing information that government officials wanted to conceal.

Assange and Villarreal argue that criminalizing such conduct violates the First Amendment. In both cases, the merits of that claim have been obscured by the constitutionally irrelevant question of who qualifies as a “real” journalist.

Assange, an Australian citizen, is fighting extradition to the United States based on a federal indictment that charges him with violating the Espionage Act by obtaining and publishing classified documents that former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning leaked in 2010. He has already spent about as much time behind bars as federal prosecutors say he would be likely to serve if convicted.

President Joe Biden says he is “considering” the Australian government’s request to drop the case against Assange. But mollifying a U.S. ally is not the only reason to reconsider this prosecution, which poses a grave threat to freedom of the press by treating common journalistic practices as crimes.

All but one of the 17 charges against Assange relate to obtaining or disclosing “national defense information,” which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Yet all the news organizations that published stories based on the confidential State Department cables and military files that Manning leaked are guilty of the same crimes.

More generally, obtaining and publishing classified information is the bread and butter of reporters who cover national security. John Demers, then head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, implicitly acknowledged that reality in 2019, when he assured reporters they needn’t worry about the precedent set by this case because Assange is “no journalist.”

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit took a similarly dim view of Villarreal in January, when it dismissed her lawsuit against the Laredo prosecutors and police officers who engineered her 2017 arrest. They claimed she had violated Section 39.06(c) of the Texas Penal Code, an obscure law that makes it a felony to solicit or obtain nonpublic information from a government official with “intent to obtain a benefit.”

Keep reading

Bipartisan bill would create “antisemitism monitors” at colleges

A pro-Israel House Democrat and Republican plan to introduce legislation creating federally sanctioned “antisemitism monitors” for select college campuses.

Why it matters: It’s the first bill introduced in Congress as a direct response to the pro-Palestinian protests that have rocked Columbia University and other colleges in recent days.

Driving the news: Reps. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) and Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) are introducing the College Oversight and Legal Updates Mandating Bias Investigations and Accountability Act – or COLUMBIA Act.

  • The bill would allow the Department of Education to send a “third-party antisemitism monitor” to any college that receives federal funding — and to revoke that funding for colleges that don’t comply.
  • The monitor, paid for by the school, would be charged with releasing a public, quarterly report evaluating “the progress that a college or university has made toward combating antisemitism.”
  • The bill was first reported by Jewish Insider.

Keep reading

Rutherford Institute Threatens First Amendment Lawsuit Over Censorship of Religious Content From High School Valedictorian’s Graduation Speech

The Rutherford Institute has come to the defense of a Florida high school valedictorian whose graduation speech was censored by school officials to alter and remove religious content.

Lucas Hudson, a valedictorian of the Collegiate Academy at Armwood High School in Hillsborough County, Fla., was ordered by school officials to remove religious references from his graduation speech in which he thanked the people who helped shape his character, reflected on how quickly time goes by, and urged people to use whatever time they have to love others and serve the God who loves us. School officials gave Lucas an ultimatum: either remove most of his speech’s religious content or he would not be speaking at all. In coming to Lucas’ defense, attorneys for The Rutherford Institute warn that the school’s actions violate the rights to freedom of speech and the free exercise of religion under the First Amendment, Florida law, and the School District’s policy, and could expose the school to a lawsuit.

“If America’s schools are to impart principles of freedom and democracy to future generations, they must start by respecting the constitutional rights of their students,” said constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute and author of Battlefield America: The War on the American People. “While the government may not establish or compel a particular religion, it also may not silence and suppress religious speech merely because others might take offense. People are free to ignore, disagree with, or counter the religious speech of others, but the government cannot censor private religious speech.”

As valedictorian of the Class of 2024 for the Collegiate Academy at Armwood High School, Lucas Hudson was provided the opportunity to give a graduation speech in May 2024. Lucas’s planned speech thanked the people who helped shape his character, reflected on how quickly times goes by, and briefly urged people to use the short amount of time we have to love others and to serve the God who loves us and who sent his son, Jesus, to save us. However, after submitting his speech to the principal, Lucas was told that his speech would not be accepted unless he reduced and changed the religious content. Although Lucas modified his speech, the religious message was still not acceptable to school officials who told Lucas that he needed to “make appropriate adjustments” to his speech by the next day or he would not be speaking at all. Lucas then changed his speech to only include a short sentence about the privilege of knowing the God who saved him.

Keep reading

FBI Turns Over Nashville, Tennessee Mass Shooter’s Manifesto To The Court

The FBI has turned over Nashville Tennessee Covenant School mass shooter Audrey Hale’s private writing and manifesto to a federal judge who will read them privately and decide how to deal with their release. 

Star News Digital Media Inc., The Tennessee Star’s parent company, sued the FBI in May 2023 after the March 2023 shooting. The news organization had claimed the FBI had violated the First Amendment by rejecting multiple Freedom of Information Act requests for Hale’s manifesto.

U.S. District Court Judge Aleta A. Trauger, who has presided over the case agreed with the Tennessee Star over a month ago that it was in the public’s interest to release the documents to determine what the motive of the mass shooting was. 

Hale killed three nine-year old children and three faculty members during her mass shooting spree before she was shot dead by law enforcement on the scene inside the school. 

Trauger will review the documents privately, before deciding whether to share the writings with the plaintiffs.

“Pursuant to this Court’s Order dated March 15, 2024, ECF No. 42, the FBI notifies the Court that today, April 17, 2024, the FBI provided the requested records to the Court for its ex parte, in camera review,” the FBI said in its formal notification.

Trauger previously said that there was “significant public interest” in the shooter’s manifesto, when a few pages were leaked by conservative commentator Steven Crowder last November. 

Those leaked pages revealed anti-white writings. 

Keep reading