Tag: 1st amendment

Texas attorney general wants students to pray in school – unless they’re Muslim

Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general running for US Senate, has long believed in school prayer. Now, he’s prescribing precisely what type of prayer he wants the state’s 6 million public school students to recite.

“In Texas classrooms, we want the Word of God opened, the Ten Commandments displayed, and prayers lifted up,” Paxton said in a statement on Tuesday, encouraging students to say “the Lord’s Prayer, as taught by Jesus Christ”.

The press release included the full text of the Lord’s Prayer as it is written in the King James version of the Bible, the latest example of Paxton and other Texas officials seeming to endorse Christianity over other faiths.

“Twisted, radical liberals want to erase Truth, dismantle the solid foundation that America’s success and strength were built upon, and erode the moral fabric of our society,” Paxton said. “Our nation was founded on the rock of Biblical Truth, and I will not stand by while the far-left attempts to push our country into the sinking sand.”

Paxton’s statement was released as Senate Bill 11 went into effect across Texas; it’s a piece of Republican legislation allowing schools to set aside time for “prayer and reading of the Bible or other religious texts” during the school day. Critics have condemned the bill as an attempt to imbue a secular public education in the state with the practice of Christianity, in violation of the US constitution’s separation of church and state.

“They’re blowing right through separation of church and state,” said Heidi Beirich, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism.

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Trump orders removal of protest tent near WH

President Donald Trump has ordered that the long-standing blue tent in front of the White House be taken down.

Trump pledged to remove homeless encampments in Washington by the United States’ 250th Independence Day next year.

A reporter informed him in the Oval Office on Friday of the tent, which represents an ongoing protest, describing it as an “eyesore” supported by the “radical left.” The reporter explained that it had “morphed” from its original intent into something “anti-America,” and expressed concern that it could pose a threat to national security.

“I didn’t know that,” Trump said, immediately turning to his staff. “Take it down. Take it down today, right now.”

“We’re going to look into it right now. We have removed over 50 tent sites, not 50 tents, hundreds and hundreds, maybe 1,000, … but 50 sites,” he continued.

The blue tent, known as the peace vigil, in Lafayette Park is regarded widely as the longest continuous act of political protest in U.S. history.

Activist William Thomas erected the structure in 1981, facing the North Lawn of the White House, where dignitaries and world leaders arrive for meetings. Thomas remained at the vigil calling for an end to global conflict and nuclear disarmament until he died in 2016. The demonstration needs to be staffed constantly to maintain its spot across Pennsylvania Avenue.

Philipos Melaku-Bello took over the structure with a group of rotating volunteers.

The tent is covered with flags and banners that read, “War is not the answer,” “Ban all nuclear weapons or have a nice doomsday,” and “Live by the bomb, die by the bomb.”

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Ken Paxton Calls For Putting Prayer And Bible Back In Texas Schools

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton urged schools to prepare for classroom prayer and Bible reading following the passage of a new state law.

“In Texas classrooms, we want the Word of God opened, the Ten Commandments displayed, and prayers lifted up,” Paxton said in a statement.

He recommended that students start with the Lord’s Prayer from Matthew 6:9-13.

He warned that the far left is actively working to strip schools of America’s spiritual foundation.

“Twisted, radical liberals want to erase Truth, dismantle the solid foundation that America’s success and strength were built upon, and erode the moral fabric of our society,” he said. “Our nation was founded on the rock of Biblical Truth, and I will not stand by while the far left attempts to push our country into the sinking sand.”

The announcement follows Senate Bill 11, approved during the 89th Legislature. The law requires school boards to vote within six months of Sept. 1, 2025, on whether to adopt policies permitting voluntary prayer and Bible reading.

The measure also directs the Attorney General’s Office to defend districts or charter schools that adopt such policies.

Supporters quickly praised the move.

“God bless you, General Paxton, for having the courage to begin the legal process of putting prayer and reading of Scripture in Texas classrooms,” Melissa Katz wrote on X.

“Amen! Thank you, sir!” added Alexander Duncan, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Critics online pushed back.

“His actions are unconstitutional. I attend mass every week. Public school should be for all, not just Christians. Note, I am a Christian/Catholic and still feel this way,” wrote Vincomputerman.

“So now students have to take time out from academics so that there can be a prayer hour? Since when can’t people pray on their own time?” asked X user Johnson@F1979J.

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More Age Verification Fallout: Artist Blogs Blocked, Porn Data Leaked, Traffic Boosts for Noncompliant Sites

As more places around the world—including U.S. states—pass laws requiring age checks around the internet, we’re continuing to see a slew of unintended (but entirely predictable) consequences. The latest round includes some U.S. residents being blocked from a blogging platform, French folks in dangers of their porn viewing habits being leaked, and porn websites that violate the law in the U.K. being rewarded with big boosts in web traffic.

Let’s start closest to home.

Another website is blocking access to Mississippi residents in response to the state’s age verification and online harm prevention law taking effect.

We’ve already seen some fallout from this law, including the social media platform Bluesky beginning to block Mississippi residents.

Now, Dreamwidth Studios—a blogging platform meant for artists (and one of the parties represented by tech trade group NetChoice in a challenge to the Mississippi law)—is also blocking access for people in Mississippi, as well as preventing minors in Tennessee from opening new accounts.

“People whose IP addresses geolocate to Mississippi will only be able to access a page that explains the issue and lets them know that we’ll be back to offer them service as soon as the legal risk to us is less existential,” Dreamwidth says on its website.

The company announced its new Mississippi policy on August 26, saying, “Mississippi residents, we are so, so sorry. We really don’t want to do this.” But “the Mississippi law is a breathtaking state overreach: it forces us to verify the identity and age of every person who accesses Dreamwidth from the state of Mississippi and determine who’s under the age of 18 by collecting identity documents, to save that highly personal and sensitive information, and then to obtain a permission slip from those users’ parents to allow them to finish creating an account.””

Dreamwidth goes on:

[The Mississippi law] also forces us to change our moderation policies and stop anyone under 18 from accessing a wide variety of legal and beneficial speech because the state of Mississippi doesn’t like it — which, given the way Dreamwidth works, would mean blocking people from talking about those things at all. (And if you think you know exactly what kind of content the state of Mississippi doesn’t like, you’re absolutely right.)

Needless to say, we don’t want to do that, either. Even if we wanted to, though, we can’t: the resources it would take for us to build the systems that would let us do it are well beyond our capacity.”

Mississippi users of Dreamwidth aren’t the only ones with restricted access. The platform will also “prevent any new account signups from anyone under 18 in Tennessee to protect ourselves against risk,” it said. “The judge in our challenge to Tennessee’s social media age verification, parental consent, and parental surveillance law (which we are also part of the fight against!) ruled last month that we had not met the threshold for a temporary injunction preventing the state from enforcing the law while the court case proceeds,” Dreamwidth posted. “The Tennessee law is less onerous than the Mississippi law and the fines for violating it are slightly less ruinous (slightly), but it’s still a risk to us.”

Dreamwidth’s moves further highlight how age verification laws like the ones enacted by Mississippi and Tennessee will come down harder on small and niche platforms than on big tech companies.

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Mississippi’s Digital ID Law Hits a Wall with Mastodon

Mississippi’s privacy-ruining online digital ID law is putting pressure on decentralized platforms, and Mastodon says it simply cannot comply.

The organization behind the software states that it lacks the technical ability to verify users’ ages and refuses to implement IP-based restrictions, which it argues would wrongly affect travelers and those temporarily located in the state.

The law, known as the Walker Montgomery Protecting Children Online Act (HB 1126), has already led to Bluesky withdrawing its service from Mississippi.

Mastodon is not following that path. Instead, it points to the design of its platform, where individual server administrators are responsible for their own compliance with local laws. Mastodon itself neither collects user data nor maintains centralized control over the network.

Although Mastodon’s nonprofit arm initially declined to comment, it later provided a statement to TechCrunch.

The organization explained that while its own servers require users to be at least 16, it does not “have the means to apply age verification” and that the software does not retain any data collected during sign-up.

A feature added in the July 2025 release of Mastodon 4.4 allows server administrators to set age minimums and manage legal terms, but does not support storing verification data.

Each server in the network operates independently. It is up to those server owners to decide whether to integrate third-party systems to check user ages.

Mastodon confirmed it cannot offer “direct or operational assistance” to these operators and instead points them to resources such as the IFTAS library, which provides guidance on trust and safety practices for federated platforms.

The nonprofit reiterated that it does not track user behavior or enforce policy across the wider ecosystem. Responsibility for legal compliance, it says, belongs to those who host and manage the servers in their own jurisdictions.

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DOJ Charges Man Who Burned American Flag in Protest of Executive Order

A man who burned the American flag outside the White House earlier this week is facing charges from federal prosecutors in accordance with President Donald Trump’s recent executive order.

That order, signed on Aug. 25, specifically directed the attorney general to prosecute those caught burning the American flag or desecrating it in other ways.

“You will see flag burning stopping immediately,” Trump said. “The people in our country don’t want to see our flag burned and spit on.”

North Carolina resident Jan Carey, 54, is the first to face that prosecution after he decided to burn the American flag as a form of protest to the executive order. In an interview with local media, he explained he “immediately thought I need to go burn a flag in front of the White House and let’s put this to the test.” He also said he was a military veteran.

Carey faces two misdemeanor criminal counts in Washington, D.C., in federal court. However, neither charge focuses on the fact that he burned the flag.

The first count was for lighting a “fire in an undesignated area,” and the second was for “lighting a fire in a manner that causes damage to real property or park resources.”

“On or about August 25, 2025, within the District of Columbia, Jan Careylit, tended, and used a fire in a manner that threatened, caused damage to, and resulted in the burning of property, real property, and park resources, and created a public safety hazard,” U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro wrote in her complaint.A Supreme Court ruling in 1989, Texas v. Johnson, declared the act of flag desecration was protected as symbolic speech under the First Amendment, and Trump directed the attorney general to pursue charges in line with the First Amendment.

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Should the Government Restrict ‘Harmful’ Speech Online?

The First Amendment prohibits the federal government from suppressing speech, including speech it deems “harmful,” yet lawmakers keep trying to regulate online discourse.

Over the summer, the Senate passed the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), a bill to allegedly protect children from the adverse effects of social media. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took procedural steps to end the debate and quickly advance the bill to a floor vote. According to Schumer, the situation was urgent. In his remarks, he focused on the stories of children who were targets of bullying and predatory conduct on social media. To address these safety issues, the proposed legislation would place liability on online platforms, requiring them to take “reasonable” measures to prevent and mitigate harm.

It’s now up to the House to push the bill forward to the President’s desk. After initial concerns about censorship, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce advanced the bill in September, paving the way for a final floor vote.

KOSA highlights an ongoing tension between free speech and current efforts to make social media “safer.” In its persistent attempts to remedy social harm, the government shrinks what is permissible to say online and assumes a role that the First Amendment specifically guards against.

At its core, the First Amendment is designed to protect freedom of speech from government intrusion. Congress is not responsible for determining what speech is permissible or what information the public has the right to access. Courts have long held that all speech is protected unless it falls within certain categories. Prohibitions against harmful speech—where “harmful” is determined solely by lawmakers—are not consistent with the First Amendment.

But bills like KOSA add layers of complexity. First, the government is not simply punishing ideological opponents or those with unfavorable viewpoints, which would clearly violate the First Amendment. When viewed in its best light, KOSA is equally about protecting children and their health. New York had similar public health and safety justifications for its controversial hate speech law, which was blocked by a district court and is pending appeal. Under this argument, which is often cited to rationalize speech limitations, the dangers to society are so great that the government should take action to protect vulnerable groups from harm. However, the courts have generally ruled that this is not sufficient justification to limit protected speech.

In American Booksellers Association v. Hudnut (1986), Judge Frank Easterbrook evaluated the constitutionality of a pornography prohibition enacted by the City of Indianapolis. The city reasoned that pornography has a detrimental impact on society because it influences attitudes and leads to discrimination and violence against women. As Judge Easterbrook wrote in his now-famous opinion, just because speech has a role in social conditioning or contributes loosely to social harm does not give the government license to control it. Such content is still protected, however harmful or insidious, and any answer to the contrary would allow the government to become the “great censor and director of which thoughts are good for us.”

In addition to the protecting children argument, a second layer of complexity is that KOSA enables censorship through roundabout means. The government accomplishes what it is barred from doing under the First Amendment by requiring online platforms to police a vast array of harms or risk legal consequences. This is a common feature of recent social media bills, which place the responsibility on platforms.

Practically, the result is inevitably less speech. Under KOSA, the platform has a “duty of care” to mitigate youth anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and addiction-like behaviors. While this provision focuses on the covered entity’s design and operation, it necessarily implicates speech since social media platforms are built around user-generated posts, from content curation to notifications. Because platforms are liable for falling short of the “duty of care,” this requirement is bound to sweep up millions of posts that are protected speech, even ordinary content that may trigger the enumerated harm. While the platform would technically be the entity implementing these policies, the government would be driving content removal.

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First Amendment Claim Rejected in Case Over Tennessee Lawmaker’s Facebook Page

Tennessee lawmaker Jeremy Faison, a prominent Republican figure and chairman of the state House GOP Caucus, has emerged at the center of a court case with broader implications for how public officials use social media and what rights their constituents have when they engage online.

Faison operates a Facebook page that blends political messaging with personal content.

That blend became a legal flashpoint when a man named Fox, who doesn’t live in Faison’s district, posted comments that were subsequently deleted.

After being blocked from the page, Fox filed a lawsuit, arguing that Faison had violated his constitutional rights.

The court didn’t see it that way.

Citing the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Lindke v. Freed, the judge determined that Faison was not acting in an official state capacity even when using the page to perform functions associated with his role as a legislator.

We obtained the opinion for you here.

Because individual lawmakers cannot, by law, speak on behalf of the state, the court said Faison’s moderation of comments wasn’t subject to First Amendment constraints.

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4chan and Kiwi Farms Sue UK Regulator Ofcom Over Online Censorship Law, Citing First Amendment Violations

Two of the internet’s most free-speech supporting platforms, 4chan and Kiwi Farms, are taking their fight for online free speech to court, targeting the UK’s communications regulator, Ofcom, for what they describe as an unconstitutional attempt to enforce British censorship laws on American websites.

In a lawsuit filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, the plaintiffs argue that the UK’s controversial Online Safety Act is not only an unlawful extraterritorial power grab but a direct attack on foundational American liberties.

Read the complaint here.

The suit calls Ofcom’s enforcement tactics a clear violation of the First Amendment and a dangerous attempt to establish global jurisdiction over online speech.

The complaint lays out how the UK’s censorship regime is being pushed onto American soil, despite the fact that both platforms operate entirely within the United States and are in full compliance with US law.

“Parliament does not have that authority. That issue was settled, decisively, 243 years ago in a war that the UK’s armies lost and are not in any position to relitigate,” Kiwi Farms stated bluntly in a letter responding to Ofcom’s demands.

Ofcom, under the new Online Safety Act, is demanding that platforms like 4chan and Kiwi Farms conduct written “risk assessments,” install content moderation systems, remove speech deemed “illegal” by UK standards, and verify the identities of their users.

The platforms face criminal penalties and steep fines of up to £18 million ($24M) or 10% of their global revenue if they refuse.

The plaintiffs argue these demands are not only legally unenforceable but blatantly unconstitutional. “Where Americans are concerned, the Online Safety Act purports to legislate the Constitution out of existence,” the lawsuit states.

Central to the challenge is the claim that Ofcom, a British corporate regulator funded by the very companies it polices, is attempting to impose UK-style speech control on a global scale.

According to the complaint, Ofcom has no lawful authority to regulate US platforms, let alone to compel speech or force the removal of content that is protected under the US Constitution.

The filing asserts that Ofcom’s threats of imprisonment and massive fines, coupled with demands for speech censorship and compelled disclosure of sensitive company information, constitute “egregious violations of Americans’ civil rights.”

The UK regulator has already targeted both platforms with a series of legal notices and threats, despite lacking jurisdiction or proper legal process.

These include multiple emails and letters declaring 4chan and Kiwi Farms in breach of UK law, none of which were served under the required UK-US Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty.

The plaintiffs argue that these attempts at enforcement are not just improper, but “repugnant to United States public policy.”

“Ofcom purports to regulate content and interactions on platforms and services with which Plaintiffs’ users are voluntarily interacting,” the complaint says. “Ofcom seeks to control those interactions in order to satisfy the whims of Ofcom employees or the UK law enforcement or political apparatuses.”

Notably, both platforms have limited or no access for UK users in response to the threats. Kiwi Farms, for instance, blocked UK IPs entirely after receiving what it interpreted as an impending Section 100 order demanding compliance.

The lawsuit requests the court to block Ofcom from issuing further demands without going through proper international legal channels and to declare the Online Safety Act’s enforcement efforts unenforceable in the United States.

It also seeks a permanent injunction against any future attempts by Ofcom to impose UK regulations on the plaintiffs.

The case stands as a direct confrontation between two visions of the internet: one based on the US constitutional tradition of free speech and open access, and another that embraces government-mandated safety regimes that can be weaponized to silence speech on a global scale.

For the plaintiffs, the message is clear: they will not yield to foreign censors. As the suit puts it, “Delaware and West Virginia are not part of the UK. Their citizens, both natural and corporate, do not answer to the UK.”

Preston Byrne of Byrne & Storm, P.C., who represents the plaintiffs, told Reclaim The Net the platforms are refusing to comply with Ofcom’s demands because “American citizens do not surrender our constitutional rights just because Ofcom sends us an e-mail.”

He praised the decision by 4chan and Kiwi Farms to stand firm against the foreign regulator, stating, “In the face of these foreign demands, our clients have bravely chosen to assert their constitutional rights.”

Byrne characterized the UK’s censorship law as a calculated attack on the American tech sector, warning that “the UK Online Safety Act is a brazen attempt by a foreign country to hobble American competitiveness and suffocate American freedom by exporting the UK’s censorship laws to our shores.”

He made it clear that the legal team would not allow such interference to go unanswered: “The First Amendment bar is prepared to hale any foreign censor into federal court at any time to defend any American.”

In a statement to Reclaim The Net, Ronald Coleman of the Coleman Law Firm, P.C., co-counsel in the suit, framed the case as a broader defense of national sovereignty and individual liberty.

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The First Amendment Does Not Protect Media Matters From Breaking The Law

Does the First Amendment immunize left-wing groups from being investigated for breaking the law? Of course not. Yet a district court recently said it does, writing an opinion that is extraordinary on its own terms, and that exemplifies the two tiers of justice our legal system sometimes affords.

First, some background. There have been credible allegations — most notably in a suit filed by X — that Media Matters for America, a left-wing nonprofit, orchestrated a coordinated effort to pressure advertisers to pull funding from X after Elon Musk acquired the company in 2022. The basic claim is that Media Matters, along with other groups, encouraged major companies to boycott advertising on X based on the platform’s refusal to censor conservatives’ speech, police information about Covid-19, and the like. If these allegations are true, then Media Matters likely violated the antitrust laws.

Enter the Federal Trade Commission. Congress has charged the FTC with enforcing (among other things) the antitrust laws. Pursuant to that authority, the FTC opened an investigation into the above-described conduct. This is neither surprising nor notable. When there are credible allegations of lawbreaking, law enforcement agencies are duty-bound to investigate them.

But rather than cooperate with the FTC and dispel suspicions that it broke the law, Media Matters sued the commission to short-circuit the investigation. Media Matters’ basic claim is that the First Amendment forbids the FTC from even investigating its potential unlawful activity because FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson and others associated with him have made comments critical of Media Matters in the past. This is an exotic claim, to say the least.

And yet a federal district judge in D.C. accepted it, enjoining the FTC from enforcing a civil investigative demand against Media Matters. The opinion is absurd, both in its cataloging of statements by various actors in and out of government and its legal conclusions about the significance of those statements. For example, here is an actual sentence from the court’s opinion: “One of [Chairman Ferguson’s] supporters, Mike Davis, who urged President Trump to nominate him to the role, made several public comments about Media Matters, including that Mr. Musk should ‘nuke’ the media company.”

It would be a big deal if investigative targets could stymie investigations by pointing to public statements by friends, associates, and “supporters” of the investigator. But that is not the law. The district judge who issued the injunction cited no comparable cases while discounting substantial contrary authority.

It is not surprising that the law doesn’t support the court’s conclusion, as the entire purpose of investigations is to determine whether lawbreaking occurred. The time for First Amendment defenses is in a resulting enforcement action. At that point, an appropriate constitutional judgment can be made against the backdrop of all the evidence — evidence a district court has now blocked the FTC from even gathering in the first place.

The court’s decision is troubling enough on its own, but it is especially so when contrasted with the judiciary’s reaction to high-profile targeting of conservatives. I am a firm believer in our legal system. Yet the disparate handling of broadly similar proceedings in recent years is concerning.  

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