Daily Archives: October 12, 2020

Audrey Greene recently rejoined the Reporters Committee for the Freedom of the Press as the Inasmuch Foundation Legal Fellow, a role focused on First Amendment issues, including libel and protection of confidential sources.

Audrey fields calls to the Reporters Committee legal hotline, drafts amicus briefs and helps provide pre-publication legal review for investigative stories produced by journalists, including documentary filmmakers.

Journalists experience a number of barriers [to press freedom], and I feel the work that the Reporters Committee is doing is increasingly essential, she said.

Audrey said she hopes to gain a deeper understanding of media law and First Amendment issues through her work with the Reporters Committee.

Audreys interest in First Amendment law blossomed in her undergraduate career at Barnard College, a private liberal arts college in New York City, where she worked on the Columbia Daily Spectator, the schools weekly student newspaper, and took courses on the First Amendment.

By the time I graduated, Audrey said, I really had a sense that I wanted to focus on media law and eventually go to law school.

Audrey graduated from Barnard College in 2015 with a bachelors degree in political science and a minor in religion. She then worked as a paralegal on Googles ads legal team before going to law school.

In 2017, she enrolled at The George Washington University Law School, where she wrote for The Federal Communications Law Journal, focusing on telecommunications law, and mentored younger students as part of the mock trial board. Audrey also worked as an intern for the Knight First Amendment Institute and as a legal intern for the Reporters Committee.

She recalled that it was Adam Marshall, a Reporters Committee staff attorney and alumni of GW law school, who inspired her to apply for the internship and, later, the fellowship position.

I came away from those conversations [with Adam] having a great impression of the organization and thinking this would be a cool place to spend some time during or after law school, she said.

Audrey received her J.D. earlier this year.

Audrey Greene is not admitted to practice law.

The Reporters Committee regularly files friend-of-the-court briefs and its attorneys represent journalists and news organizations pro bono in court cases that involve First Amendment freedoms, the newsgathering rights of journalists and access to public information. Stay up-to-date on our work by signing up for our monthly newsletter and following us on Twitter or Instagram.

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Reporters Committee welcomes Inasmuch Foundation Legal Fellow - Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

Gene Policinski. Photo courtesy Freedom Forum

By GENE POLICINSKI

Just how free should a free press be to report on the illness and condition of a sitting president during a national health emergency?

And how free are we to publicly offer our thoughts on the matter?

Both questions have the same legal answer: The First Amendment places no limits on what journalists, bloggers or others might report, and what we might say or speculate about the health of the president.

So, whats left are the First Amendment-ish concerns for reporters from longstanding national security concerns to a possible zone of personal privacy.

And given our fractured, polarized and politically divided society, the rise of social media puts all of us in that kind of -ish situation balancing our right to speak out in any way we choose against the social norms we should consider and the fact that theres no First Amendment insulation for us from the reaction to what we say.

The news that President Trump was infected with the COVID-19 virus came first in his own tweet, not through the news media, just after midnight on Oct. 2. Within minutes, news organizations relayed that dramatic news. Social media began firing up, with comments, forecasts and to put it gently sharp examples of the nations political divide.

To top it all off, a whirlwind of announcements, reports and commentary some contradictory on Trumps illness, brief hospitalization and now his ongoing treatment at the White House is unfolding in the midst of the final weeks of the 2020 presidential campaign.

For the record, U.S. history offers any number of examples of non-disclosure, image manipulation, complaints about White House transparency and press coverage of presidential health and public debate over the public comments about it all.

AfterPresident James Garfieldwas shot in 1881 at a Washington D.C., railroad station, official statements reported his condition as good or stable despite the reality that he suffered for two months from a bullet that could not be removed, before dying. With the bulletins distributed nationwide by telegraph, published in the nations newspapers and followed closely by the public, the story of Garfields fight to survive could be considered Americas first live media event, historianRobert Mitchellwrites inThe Washington Post.

President Woodrow Wilsoncollapsed from exhaustion in 1919 during a national speaking tour, and we now know he suffered a stroke a month later that left him partially paralyzed. Americans didnt learn even basic facts about Wilsons health until he left office.

Not only were there no White House announcements, some historians now dub his wife Edith as the first female president given the 17-month stint in which she consulted with him on virtually all presidential business and screened all contacts and correspondence.

As USA TODAY noted in a story this week, in 1944 a similar scene played out whenPresident Franklin Delano Rooseveltwas diagnosed with acute congestive heart failurethat forced him into seclusion for months. The report noted that the country was in the midst of World War II and the U.S. military was in the final stages of preparing for the D-Day invasion that opened the second front in the war.

Similar national security concerns have been raised about press reports of the details on Trumps condition. Would terrorists or hostile nations seek advantage or perhaps plan an attack in the U.S. or abroad knowing the commander-in-chief of U.S. forces remained on the job even as we learned from journalists that he was hospitalized, or facing medication and treatment for high fever and low blood oxygen levels that could have reduced his ability to converse or process information?

There are two unique circumstances with Trumps illness that werent present even as recently as when President Ronald Reagan was wounded in a 1981 assassination attempt, or underwent colon surgery: A global, instantaneous, 24/7 news environment, coupled with todays pervasive social media.

Beyond the national security concerns, are there some health matters that should remain private and not placed openly before the planet either out of personal consideration or to avoid becoming distorted as election-year fodder?

And there is the often-harsh tenor and frequently unsourced/unverified content of social media. Even a brief sampling showed posts ranging from conservative speakers making unsupported claims that journalists were hoping Trump would die, to Trump opponents posting images comparing Trumps balcony salute as he returned from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to similar poses struck by dictators such as Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini and Juan Peron. To be fair, there also were great numbers of well wishes, too.

Again, while the First Amendment save for actual physical threats protects what we could say online, even as it provides no limits or advice on what we should say.

A free-press issue of a different sort has erupted. On Monday, White House Press SecretaryKayleigh McEnanyrevealed she had tested positive for the virus. Various press reports said correspondents were angry they had been exposed during briefings and other meetings with her and other officials over the previous few days.

An unnamed reporter wasquoted inVanity Faironline saying, People are livid. There are a lot of us, like dozens of reporters, who feel its unsafe to be doing it the way its being done. CBS News Ben Tracy commented on Twitter: I felt safer reporting in North Korea than I currently do reporting at The White House. This is just crazy.

As of Tuesday, three journalists in the White House press pool had tested positive. In theVanity Fairreport, White House Correspondents Association PresidentZeke Miller, a reporter for The Associated Press, said that journalists at the White House have been mindful of these risks for months. At the end of the day, were there to keep the American people informed and to be their eyes and ears. That job needs to get done. Were assuming some of these risks, were there to do the job.

In the final analysis, performing that First Amendment job of being a watchdog on government even during a pandemic by reporting the facts, fairly and accurately, as they can be found, is the best medicine for a health democracy.

. . .

Gene Policinski is a senior fellow for the First Amendment at the Freedom Forum, and 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 5: Trump and COVID-19 -- How 'free' are/should we be? - Salina Post

Republican voters in Des Moines County have been targeted for their political views through sign theft and vandalism, as well as letters.

In the shadow COVID-19 has cast across America lurks another problem, sinister because it is the product of humans wishing to harm others.

We're talking political yard sign looting.

Theft and disfigurement of political yard signs is a clear signal that opposing political viewpoints are not fortifying America's belief in the First Amendment.

The short view is this: You have the right to freedom of expression. You do not have the right to trespass or steal.

Political bannering goes back to John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the U.S., who, according to a blog by the Municipal Supply & Sign Co. in Florida, "wanted to get an edge on his opponent in his presidential campaign run and convinced townspeople to put up his signs in their yards."

However, the blog goes on to clarify, Adams was not the original inventor of political signs that dates back to Ancient Rome.

"In those days," the blog says, "scribbles on walls were the form of advertising they used for political purposes."

Things haven't changed much in the past 2,000 years.

In our modern times, Democrats and Republicansare still scribbling, but now the medium is a flat paper or plastic rectangle about 18 by 24 inches, supported by a wire or wooden stake and planted in a voter's yard.

This year's contentious presidential election has polarized, galvanized and insanitized Americans into doing something they'd never consider in saner times: trespassing on a stranger's property to steal or vandalize private property.

The Washington Post reported last month that in the key state of Pennsylvania, former Vice President Joe Biden is getting hit hard.

"It usually happens in the dark of night, local Democrats say, but sometimes in daylight," the Post said. "Sometimes entire streets or neighborhoods are cleared."

President Donald Trump is getting hit, too: The Boston Globe said, "The Trump yard sign-stealing epidemic has gotten seriously out-of-hand in Massachusetts."

Here in Southeast Iowa, examples of sign theft can be found easily by asking someone pushing a cart in your local grocery store: Hey, stranger, have you had any political yard signs stolen this year?

Or just get on Facebook and you'll find plenty of mis/information.

But is sign theft rampant in Southeast Iowa? In Des Moines County, officials harbor widely differing views on the magnitude of sign raiding.

Terry Davis, chairman of the Des Moines County Republicans, said they've had to replace about 50 signs in the past 45 days.

"They deface signs at night, mainly the barn signs the 4-by-8s," Davis said. "There's an individual who lives on Sunnyside, he's a friend of mine; they've defaced his sign with vulgar language. They're a block and a half from the school. I'm ashamed of the people in Burlington who would stoop that low."

Aldo Leopold Intermediary School is just up the street from the defaced Trump sign, and youths tramp back and forth where the obscenities are easily seen.

Davis said the sign's homeowner has had a lot of people stopping by to sympathize offer to paint the sign and helpanyway they can.

"We all have different views, but to do what whoever's doing, it's a disgrace," Davis said.

Tom Courtney, co-chair of the Des Moines County Democrats, said sign theft is, for his party, insignificant.

"I'm talking about Biden," Courtney said. "Now and then, somebody will say, 'Oh, I had my Biden sign stolen,' but I think usually it's the weather did it. You have signs that've been out there a while, you get a windy day and they blow right out and it'll twist 'em all up. I'm sure people throw them in the garbage if they're all twisted up."

He said he thinks kids are the main culprits, not political vigilantes.

"I don't think there's very many adults who do it," he said. "It's a good target for kids."

Courtney and Davis may be political opposites, but they agree on at least one thing.

"I think it's poor taste to do it anywhere," Courtney said.

Sheriff Mike Johnstone said yard sign pilferage isn't really an issue in rural parts of Des Moines County.

"It's normal to have a few come up misplaced or missing, but no, we haven't had any marked vandalism towards any political party or candidate, so we're all happy about that," Johnstone said. "It seems like most everybody is leaving them alone."

He said yard owners themselves often are culpable.

"A lot of times you'll find one missing because they've pulled them up to cut the grass," Johnstone said.

Johnstone agreed with Courtney that most of the thefts are likely by youths.

"It's kind of a Halloween thing. I can't see any particular candidate being picked on at all. If they are, people aren't calling and complaining," Johnstone said. "It's pretty normal for all candidates: they've got a few missing here or there."

County engineer Brian Carter said one problem is political signs being planted on county road easements.

"That's true for most presidential elections, but maybe a little more common this year," Carter said. "They aren't allowed in the right-of-way, but as long as they don't create a safety hazard, we don't get involved."

A typical example of a voting victim in the middle of the political spectrum is retired Army Master Sgt. Elizabeth van Vleck-Sally, who lives in Burlington and doesn't do Facebook.

"I'm an independent," van Vleck-Sally said. "I have Kevin Glendening and Miller-Meeks she's a friend of mine and Joni Ernst and the Trump-Pence sign. Its the Trump-Pence sign that seems to set everybody off."

Her Trump sign was stolen recently, so she called the police. As an officer was interviewing her, a man stopped his car in the middle of the street.

"He got out of the car and yelled at me: Are you talking to him about your sign being stolen? And I said, yes," van Vleck-Sally said. "He says, 'Im headed on over to the Republican headquarters to get some more; do you want me pick you up one, too? And he did."

The 78-year-old woman has been taking no chances since then that sign goes indoors every night.

Like many Trump fans, van Vleck-Sally has received anonymous letters in the mail. Disguised as legitimate campaign material, they start out with a tirade against president Trump before slithering into insults against the recipient.

"I got a letter from Jane Doe, 123 Main St. So I went out on my front yard and opened it you never know what's inside those letters," van Vleck-Sally said. "It was all this horrible stuff about Trump. But then when it got down to the bottom, I became a 'disgusting, stupid person' and they started bashing me."

One of the letters she received says, ungrammatically, "Take a hard look at yourself and fix this unfortunate mess you are." The second one begins, "If you just throw this message away without reading and thinking about it you are a horrible human being, a despicable United States of America citizen" before going on to mis-name "Robert Barr" as the current U.S. attorney general.

The third letter carbon-copies the same anti-Trump opinions as the first two.

"I'm an old timer, I believe sticks and stones will break my bones type stuff," van Vleck-Sally said.

She thinks the letter writer/s got her address from the Des Moines County GIS mapping website. A GIS geographic information system is a computer system for manipulating data related to positions on Earth's surface.GIScan show different kinds of data on onemap, including streets, buildingsand vegetation. Most counties in the U.S. use GIS.

"The concern I have with people using the GIS to find out who a person is and sending them nasty letters is basically what I wrote to The Hawk Eye a letter to the person sending me the letters," van Vleck-Sallysaid. "I don't give a crap where he got my name, he got my name completely wrong. People have a tendency to call me Sally. They think Sally is my first name. They're not looking very hard."

Van Vleck-Sally sent a letter to Des Moines County supervisor Tom Broeker, who introduced it at the supervisors meeting this past Tuesday.

"I received a letter from I'm not going to use any names with concerns that people were using the county GIS website to get contact information on people with political signs in their yards, and then sending anonymous letters to those residents," Broeker said. "I really hope this isn't 'happening. I'm aware that the First Amendment doesn't enjoy the widespread support it once held, but this is the United States of America; the people with whom one may disagree have the same constitutional rights to express their political opinions as everyone else. If you're aware of anybody that does this, please discourage this."

Burlington Mayor Jon Billups agreed.

"I would like to think we are still the land of the free, andthat the First Amendment still applies to all," Billups said. "It is criminal that lawns signs are stolen or defaced regardless of who they support."

"I can vote for whoever I damn well please, thats my right," van Vleck-Sally said.

Van Vleck-Sally's letter to the newspaper was intended for "Jane Doe" to read; it said, in part, "I am not an unfortunate mess, as you state in your letter. I am a citizen who has the same rights as everyone else to voice my opinion and display signs in my own yard."

"I tried to be as polite as I could, reminding this person, whoever it is, that everybody has a right to do whatever they want to do," van Vleck-Sally said. "It's my right to vote for whoever I want to vote for, without having to worry about getting nasty letters. How many other people has this person done this to? Its just not just me. It could have been a lot of people."

Van Vleck-Sally said her neighbor posted one of the letters on Facebook.

"There's a whole bunch of people said she deserved it," van Vleck-Sallysaid. "And there's a whole bunch of people that said, 'Oh, we feel so sorry for you.' Don't feel sorry for me. Just try to stop this idiot."

She said it's not just Trump people who are targeted; its everybody.

"Come on, folks, grow up," the septuagenarian chided.

The local police say yard sign pilfering isn't a major concern in these COVID-19-riddled days.

Burlington police officer Grant Hillyer said yard sign theft is a simple misdemeanor that would result in a citation with a court date, just like a speeding ticket. Any fine would be up to the judge, ranging from $65 to $500.

"Being outside, it's a little bit tougher to prove," Hillyer said. "Charges can be pressed, but as far as going to jail right now? It's not going to happen."

That's because of COVID-19 and social distancing mandates, which would be too difficult to enforce in a jail overflowing with sign bandits.

More: Man steals Biden yard sign is then caught stealing newspapers detailing his theft

Des Moines CountyAttorney Lisa Schaefer said criminal trespass under Iowa Code 716.7 and 716.8 is generally a simple misdemeanor punishable with a fine of $260 for the first offense, $645 for the second offense and $1,285 for a third or subsequent offense.If the trespass results in injury or damage of more than $300, the penalties increase.

"Degree of theft under Iowa Code 714.1 and 714.2 depends upon the value of the property," Schaefer said. "If the value is undetermined or is under $300, then it is a simple misdemeanor, punishable by up to 30 days in the county jail and/or a fine of $105 to $855 and any applicable restitution."

Depending on value, the charge and fine can go as high as aggravated misdemeanor, with up to two years in prison and a maximum fine of $8,540, plus any applicable restitution.

Criminal mischief can be defined as a hate crime if it is committed against a person or a persons property because of the persons race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin,political affiliation, sex, sexual orientation, age, or disability,

Schaefer said if letters are sent intending to intimidate, alarm or annoy another person, without any threats of physical harm, it's considered third-degree harassment, punishable by up to one year in the county jail and/or a fine of $430 to $2,560, and any applicable restitution.

All sources contacted said if you plan to put out a campaign yard sign, the best way to protect it is by keeping it in a well-lit area, close to your home.

"Unless they have trail cams, or some kind of security system that would monitor the location of the sign, there's not much they can do," Davis advised.

Motion-activated cameras range in price from $20 for a battery-powered pet camera to almost $1,000 for a multi-camera night vision system with a huge hard drive. Be sure the storage media is removable and easily interfaced with a device other than the camera; a computer, for example. You'll want to give incriminating video to the police.

Be sure to write your name on the sign: If you nab someone on-camera, it can be tricky proving the yard sign they stole is actually yours.

Americans are an innovative herd, and here are some of the things recommended on social media in order to discourage political hijackers.

The Washington Post offered this nugget:

We put barbed wire around them and push pins in the plastic just to keep the signs from being taken because we have cameras so we can watch them run out and grab the signs," Bowling Green, Kentucky, Trump supporter Mario Dominguez told the Post after having four previous signs stolen.

The Boston Globe's Boston.com said in November, "An Andover residents property was swarmed by police in response to a suspicious-looking black box taped to his handmade Trump sign."

More than one online posting takes the Second Amendment approach, but that's extreme for something as harmless as a one-dollar piece of cardboard with a political statement.

Van Vleck-Sally cautions against the lock-n-load approach.

"I have a carry permit, but that doesn't mean I can shoot people," the pistol-packing grandmother said.

Possibly the cleverest sign-theft deterrent was by an Indiana man who mowed his lawn to read "TRUMP" in large block letters.

So, what's your duty here as an American? Steal opposing signs? Tear them down? Paint vulgarities upon someone else's signs?

Don't be ridiculous: Your duty as an American citizen is to express your political beliefs, and if someone harasses you for what you believe politically, dutifully report them.

Trespassing and property theft are crimes. Posting your views online or in your local newspaper is not a crime.

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Candidates and voters alike suffer as yard signs are targeted for theft and vandalism - Burlington Hawk Eye