Category Archives: Free Speech

How has the Supreme Court's 2010 decision in favor of Citizens United changed the political fundraising landscape and impacted elections?

That will be the subject of the next Free Speech Caf, sponsored by Western Michigan University's We Talk Tuesday March 15th at 11am. Public Media Network will stream the discussion. A recording will be available later for viewing and listening.

WMUK Content Director Gordon Evans will moderate the conversation with Rodericka Applewhaite, senior communications advisor for the Michigan Democratic Party, and Republican political strategist Jason Cabel Roe.

Find more details about the event on Tuesday March 15th.

A campus viewing party is planned for 11 a.m. in Room 1024 of the Lee Honors College. Seating is limited and registration is required.

WMU We Talk/Courtesy photo

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Rodericka Applewhaite

Rodericka Applewhaite grew up in Georgia and is a political research and communications professional who has worked on several federal and statewide Democratic campaigns.

Jason Cabel Roe

WMU We Talk/courtesy photo

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For nearly 30 years, Western Michigan University graduate Jason Roe has worked as a political and communications strategist. Hes nationally recognized for his work in campaigns and government advising candidates for President, Congress, Governor, and state and local office, as well as free market interests and political parties.

Western Michigan University We Talk

The purpose of We Talk is to foster a campus culture of responsible and respectful civic, social, political and policy engagement.We seek to raise awareness about free speech protections and promote the value of respecting viewpoint diversity as part of the academic setting and learning environment.

We Talk '22 is designed to build upon We Talk programming held in 2021 and will focus on building our skill sets and providing academic tools for having difficult conversations.

We Talk program development is guided by the principles and practices of the Heterodox Academy, which is focused on improving the quality of research and education in universities by increasing open inquiry, viewpoint diversity, and constructive disagreement. Your donation can help provide vital support to this initiative.

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Money's impact on elections and free speech - WMUK

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'Contrary to what you believe about democratic governments spying on its citizens, they are.'

Author of the article:

Big Brother is actually watching you and your every move.

In other words, your privacy rights are being trampled on and they are being violated by governments and big tech companies. Both are egregious abuses of power.

You may shrug it off and say to yourself: I have nothing to worry about, I live a clean life.

Then one day, says William Binney, a veteran of the U.S. National Security Agency, you become irritated by an act of overreach by your government. So you decide to exercise your right to freedom of speech and thought and your right to peacefully protest. And you stand in front of City Hall and call out what you believe to be an injustice.

When you do that, you will be put on a watchlist. They will find you and quickly. Thats because you and your data left electronic fingerprints everywhere. And contrary to what you believe about democratic governments spying on its citizens, they are.

They will use the information they gathered about you, against you.

Binney, a 36-year veteran of the NSA, says what the government is doing is unconstitutional.

Binney was granted special recognition by the Allard Prize for International Integrity for blowing the whistle on the NSA for using a program he developed called ThinThread to spy on Americans.

Stuart McNish invited William Binney to join him for a Conversation that Matters about your loss of privacy, both in Canada and the United States.

Please become a Patreon subscriber and support the production of this program, with a $1 pledge here.

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Conversations That Matter: Have we lost our right to free speech? - Vancouver Sun

We recently discussed controversies involving Russian artists and athletes being told that they will be cancelled or blacklisted if they do not expressly denounce the Russian invasion of Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin. Now that assault on free speech has reached the highest levels of ballet after Tugan Sokhiev, the chief conductor at Bolshoi Theatre and the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, resigned rather than be coerced into such public statements. The Munich Philharmonic also dismissed chief conductor Valery Gergiev after he failed to condemn the invasion.

Sokhiev is one of the most celebrated and respected conductors in the world. He also happens to be Russian. For many, his musical contributions became secondary when he failed to publicly condemn Putin. They demanded that he speak or resign. He resigned.

Sokhievwrote on Facebook during last few days I witnessed something I thought I would never see in my life. In Europe, today I am forced to make a choice and choose one of my musical family over the other.

As we previously discussed, it is during wartime and periods of social discord that the greatest abuses can occur for those with dissenting or unpopular views. Despite mystrong support for Ukraine and condemnation of Putin, it is important for advocates of civil liberties and free speech to stand against such blacklisting and compelled speech.

For many, this is hardly a new movement. For years, powerfulpoliticians,academics, and even some in themedia have demanded more censorship. This move against Russian performers and athletes may draw the unwitting into this anti-free speech movement. The response to those of us who are raising concerns is the same and predictable. You are called an apologist for Putin or a traitor to the cause. It is an effort to create a glacial chilling effect on dissenting voices.

Once again, it is important to addressthe rationalization on the leftfor attacks on free speech in recent years: the First Amendment only protects speech from government crackdowns. The First Amendment is not the full or exclusive embodiment of free speech. It addresses just one of the dangers to free speech posed by government regulation. Many of us view free speech as a human right. Corporate censorship of social media clearly impacts free speech, and replacing Big Brother with a cadre of Little Brothers actually allows for far greater control of free expression. As I have noted earlier, while liberal writers and artists were blacklisted and investigated in the 1950s, liberal activists have succeeded in censoring opposing views to an unprecedented degree in recent years. Rather than burn books, they havesimply gotten stores to ban them or blacklist the authors, athletes, and artists.

Figures like the great singer Paul Robeson (right) found themselves barred from performances due to their refusal to condemn others or Russia.

Some, however, are not intimidated but rather incensed by the attack on free speech. In the meantime, at least one opera lover is boycotting the Met after it cancelled another great Russian artist for not publicly reciting the official line against Putin. I recently received the attached letter from a donor at the Met who stated that he was changing his will over the controversy involving soprano Anna Netrebko. He would no longer leave his estate to the Met and pledged to stop his regular contributions to the institution.

As for Sokhiev, he noted that in both cities he regularly invited Ukrainian singers and conductors because we never even thought about our nationalities. We were enjoying making music together.

The response from the mayor of Toulouse, Jean-Luc Moudenc, was particularly telling. While denying that they demanded that Sokhiev make a choice between his native country and his beloved city of Toulouse, the mayor added: However, it was unthinkable to imagine that he would remain silent in the face of the war situation, both vis--vis the musicians and the public and the community.

It is not unthinkable. He may support the invasion or fear for himself or his family in opposing this tyrant. It does not matter his reasons. He should have a right to hold opposing views or to remain silent. What is unthinkable is that artists are being blacklisted for refusing to recite political statements like some reeducation camp in the Cultural Revolution. It is a curious way to fight tyranny by denying free speech.

The Met donor allowed me to post the following version of his letter:

Peter Gelb letter_1

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Bolshoi Conductor Resigns Over Free Speech Controversy as the Crackdown Continues for Artists and Athletes - Jonathan Turley

The Supreme Court is hearing a case about a federal program that never took place, the Clean Power Plan. Clean Power Plan has never been implemented, so why is SCOTUS hearing a case and why is this important?

The Thom Hartmann Program covers diverse topics including immigration reform, government intrusion, privacy, foreign policy, and domestic issues. More people listen to or watch the TH program than any other progressive talk show in the world! Join them. #MorefromThom

The Thom Hartmann Program is on Free Speech TV every weekday from 12-3 pm EST.

Missed an episode? Check out Thom Hartmann Playlist on our Youtube channel or visit the show page for the latest clips.

#FreeSpeechTV is one of the last standing national, independent news networks committed to advancing progressive social change.

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Can The Supreme Court End The EPA? (w/ Amy Westervelt) - Free Speech TV

As Fox News mounts its defense in the Dominion case and in a lawsuit by another voting systems company, Smartmatic, the networks lawyers have argued that core to the First Amendment is the ability to report on all newsworthy statements even false ones without having to assume responsibility for them.

The public had a right to know, and Fox had a right to cover, its lawyers wrote. As for inviting guests who made fallacious claims and spun wild stories, the network quoting the Sullivan decision argued that giving them a forum to make even groundless claims is part and parcel of the uninhibited, robust and wide-open debate on matters of public concern.

Last week, a federal judge ruled that the Smartmatic case against Fox could go forward, writing that at this point, plaintiffs have pleaded facts sufficient to allow a jury to infer that Fox News acted with actual malice.

The broadness of the First Amendment has produced strange bedfellows in free speech cases. Typically, across the political spectrum there is a recognition that the cost of allowing unrestrained discourse in a free society includes getting things wrong sometimes. When a public interest group in Washington State sued Fox in 2020, alleging it willfully and maliciously engaged in a campaign of deception and omission about the coronavirus, many First Amendment scholars were critical on the grounds that being irresponsible is not the same as acting with actual malice. That lawsuit was dismissed.

But many arent on Foxs side this time. If the network prevails, some said, the argument that the actual malice standard is too onerous and needs to be reconsidered could be bolstered.

If Fox wins on these grounds, then really they will have moved the needle too far, said George Freeman, executive director of the Media Law Resource Center and a former lawyer for The New York Times. News organizations, he added, have a responsibility when they publish something that they suspect could be false to do so neutrally and not appear to be endorsing it.

Fox is arguing that its anchors did query and rebut the most outrageous allegations.

Paul Clement, a lawyer defending Fox in the Smartmatic case, said one of the issues was whether requiring news outlets to treat their subjects in a skeptical way, even if their journalists doubt that someone is being truthful, was consistent with the First Amendment.

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First Amendment Scholars Want to See the Media Lose These Cases - The New York Times

About a year ago, writer and University of Berkeley professor Grace Lavery accepted a six-figure deal from Substack, under the newsletter platform's Pro scheme. At the end of January this year, Lavery decided to leave the platform, "belatedly," severing contractual ties and closing her account.

"Ive never been under any illusions about why a literary scholar specializing in Victorian literature and psychoanalysis was offered a lot of money by a tech startup," she wrote in a post on her blog. "It's because Im a trans woman, and about a year ago, Substack was facing public criticism for its publication of a number of authors critical of the movement for trans civil rights."

Lavery acknowledged that Substack's publisher agreement insists users must not use the platform "in a manner that is fraudulent, deceptive, threatening, abusive, harassing," but wrote, "I no longer have any faith that the executive team at Substack will enforce these Terms of Use, or the Content Guidelines. Because I do not trust that the platform will enforce its own rules, Im leaving."

Her move comes after a long trail of transphobic incidents on Substack. Lavery is now a part of an exodus of Substack writers, overwhelmingly considering it a home for users expressing transphobic comments and making money for such views (notably, Lavery herself was suspended off Twitter last month, for saying she hoped the Queen would die when diagnosed with Covid-19).

Such a collective reaction to Substack's refusal to tackle misinformation and hate speech is still happening. Writers are publicly speaking out about leaving Substack or calling out the company's policies when it comes to free speech, content moderation, and censorship.

It happened first in 2021, when trans writers including Jude Ellison Sady Doyle, Nathan Tankus, and Yanyi called out Substack in the wake of the platform's refusal to remove harmful content. In a final post on Substack before departing for nonprofit publishing platform Ghost, Doyle wrote that Substack has chosen to "platform hate groups." Meanwhile, Yanyi wrote, "I have no faith that Substack will protect me or other trans people from harassment or abuse."

This type of hateful content has been produced by people like British writer Graham Linehan, who posted libellous harassment, transphobic remarks, and hate speech towards Lavery and others through his Substack newsletter. Linehan was permanently kicked off Twitter in 2020 for "repeated violations of our rules against hateful conduct and platform manipulation." He remains on Substack, however, with thousands of paid subscribers.

Substack itself published a post around this time, doubling-down on their "hands-off philosophy" on content moderation, saying that writers and readers on Substack are "in charge" of what they say and who they subscribe to. "Writers own their content and their mailing lists and have full editorial control on Substack. Readers choose for themselves which writers to invite into their inboxes and their minds," the post read. It underscored the ideas in Substack's content moderation guidelines: that the platform is "different from social media platforms," writers are paid by the readers, who, in turn, "are in full control of what they see."

In January 2022, Mashable reported on Substack newsletters that promote anti-vaccine sentiments and COVID-19 misinformation, with writers like Dr. Joseph Mercola, Steve Kirsch, and Alex Berenson, each known for publishing a slew of misinformation surrounding the pandemic, finding a home on Substack after being deplatformed elsewhere. "The reason I chose a paid membership platform on Substack is because it will protect all of my content from censorship," Mercola wrote of launching his newsletter on the platform.

Following this report, Substack subsequently published a post through its company newsletter, written by CEO Chris Best and co-founders Jairaj Sethi and Hamish McKenzie. They described the "growing pressure" they face to censor content that "to some seems dubious or objectionable."

"We believe that when you use censorship to silence certain voices or push them to another place, you don't make the misinformation problem disappear but you do make the mistrust problem worse," they wrote.

The founders added that they will continue to give power to both readers and writers, and will "take a strong stance in defense of free speech."

This post, for Lavery, was a tipping point and the motivation behind her final decision to leave Substack.

She tells Mashable that her complaints about Linehan were "being taken seriously" by Substack's content moderation team via email, but they insisted "his conduct passed Terms of Use." Lavery also cited the distinction between free speech and harassment, saying, "It seems really weird that [Substack] is unwilling to make that distinction."

K. Tempest Bradford, a writer and teacher, also left Substack this year, in a similar protest.

"By not moderating, Substack isn't creating more trust, they're fostering an environment that's unsafe for marginalized, vulnerable people," she tells Mashable. Bradford says Substack's statement in January wasn't the catalyst for her decision, but it "certainly solidified" that she had made the right one for herself.

"It's irresponsible, especially at this stage of the internet," she says.

Similarly, Kirsten Han, a journalist and activist based in Singapore, was amongst the writers who left the platform. Han wrote a newsletter on Substack about politics, civil society, and social justice in Singapore; she was also the recipient of a grant from the company in April 2020. But she left Substack last year (moving to Ghost, too), citing transphobia on Substack and even raising direct concerns with the company about Linehan's content. This past year, she has also used Twitter to call out COVID misinformation on Substack and the company's hands-off approach to content moderation.

"Substack and tech companies should be working to be transparent, thoughtful, to work with civil society on their responsibilities," she says.

Like Bradford, Han tells Mashable that Substack has a responsibility "to moderate more," especially because some of the newsletters spreading hate speech "are getting a wide reach" and being monetized.

Many of the newsletter writers passing along misinformation and reiterating transphobic views are amongst Substack's paid users. Writers who use a subscription model include Linehan, Mercola, Berenson, and Kirsch. Paid creators keep 90 percent of the revenue, while Substack keeps ten. It's an appealing offer: the platform offered is sleek, efficient, and potentially financially rewarding.

According to the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), Substack has accumulated at least $2.5 million in revenue due to anti-vaccine newsletters, per year. The non-profit NGO said that Mercola and Berenson are the main contributors to this revenue, making "a combined $183,000 a month."

And, despite backlash from a band of writers and users, Substack has raked in the numbers overall: the company garnered over 35 million views in January 2022 alone, according to SimilarWeb. There are over 1 million paid subscriptions to publications on Substack, according to the company, and the top 10 paid publications on the platform "bring in more than $20 million a year."

Lavery, Han, and Bradford all seem to agree that the financial gains writers those who spread harm and hate are deriving from Substack furthered their dissatisfaction with the company. Such numbers fed into Bradford's withstanding argument for leaving, she says: "The revelation that the company paid certain writers what amounted to a salary in order to get them to publish their newsletters via Substack."

Han appreciates the argument Substack's leaders are grappling with.

"I get that its a complicated issue. I get the desire to protect and defend free speech and be a platform for free speech. Its an issue I work on a lot in Singapore. I just felt like [Substack] wasnt making sufficient distinctions and being upfront with themselves about their responsibilities. If whats being spread is false, thats not free speech. I dont feel comfortable with that false equivalency being set up," Han says.

Lavery also expresses "some sort of sympathy" with Substack.

"If they were found to have editorial control over any part of their platform, they would lose their business degree it would fall to the floor," she says. "The moment they do that, they stop being a publisher, and they start being a publication."

When approached for comment, a Substack representative told Mashable that they "respect writers' decision about where they want to publish their work," which is why they "make it easy" to pack up a Substack newsletter and neatly transition to other platforms.

"While it sucks whenever writers leave the platform, we continue to believe in freedom of the press and freedom of expression, and we will continue our hands-off approach to content moderation," they said.

Notably, there are those who are critical of Substack but continue to use the platform. Kent Anderson, a former publisher at Science from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and publishing director of the New England Journal of Medicine, has been a Substack user since 2018, via his newsletter The Geyser. He has been outspoken about the presence of misinformation on the platform.

"I got to know the founders [of Substack], and interviewed them for The Geyser, where they touted Substack as an alternative to misinformation platforms and one devoted to the truth," Anderson says. He believes they have since "abandoned" their stance.

"When you enter the information space, you have a duty to care aboutwhether the information you're putting out is accurate, about whatreaders might think or believe based on what you tell them, aboutyourreputation within society, and about integrity and compassion," Anderson says. "This goes for anyone involved, including platform providers." He adds Substack is feeding into "a vicious cycle" of misinformation and distrust.

Anderson has not yet left Substack, but tells Mashable that he is "considering options and alternatives," continuing to remain on the platform for the moment.

For many, the attractiveness Substack can offer has just not been enough to mitigate certain decisions. Han tells Mashable, "In a way, [leaving] worked out. Before all of this, though, I was happy at Substack."

Related Video: How to recognize and avoid fake news

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Substack creators are leaving the platform over misinformation and hate speech - Mashable

OPINION:

Led by Americas example, Western countries have shined as a global refuge for free expression and religious liberty, standing in contrast to the many authoritarian governments that act as paternalistic gatekeepers of their citizens speech.

Sadly, religious liberty is under siege in the West. State-imposed, social media endorsed, tyrannical censorship continues to seep into nations such as Finland and Canada as they attempt to purge dissident thought through prison sentences. If we are not careful, this contagion could soon affect American citizens First Amendment rights, including religious freedom.

Pivi Rsnen, a 62-year-old grandmother and former minister of Finlands Parliament for 26 years, was recently labeled a threat to society before being charged by Finlands Prosecutor General with three counts of ethnic agitation, a hate speech offense found in Finlands criminal code.

Why? Rsnen publicly professed her views on marriage and sexuality in a tweet quoting biblical scripture. Authorities interrogated Rsnen regarding her Christian beliefs and the tweets meaning before expanding the investigation into an unwarranted evidence-collecting mission to further uncover her beliefs on marriage and sexuality. She posted the tweet in 2019, but authorities dug back decades into her personal beliefs to build their case.

As a result, this 62-year-old grandmother is now facing jail time for a tweet.

Rsnen has not been the only Finnish citizen swept up in the countrys persecution of religious beliefs. Juhana Pohjola, Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland, was also indicted alongside Rsnen for a pamphlet he published in 2004. This pamphlet expressed his religious convictions and personal views on marriage and was published 4 years before the hate speech laws enactment.

Rsnen and Pohjola are each facing two years in jail and appeared in court for another hearing on February 14.

In both cases, the laws allegedly violated did not even exist when some of the evidence was created. Finland legalized same-sex marriage in 2017, just 5 years ago, and the hate speech laws were not enacted until 2008. If the charges are upheld, they will represent a remarkable escalation and a dangerous precedent. Ex post facto law is a hallmark of tyranny, as people may be punished at the whim of those in power.

The weaponization of the courts against faith leaders and public servants alike is rapidly dismantling and eroding Western values, including freedom of speech and religious liberty. At the same time, it is chipping away at the cultural, historical, and faith-based traditions of Finland and other nations. Perhaps the Finnish government should look at its own flag, which features the blue Nordic cross, to see a reminder of the countrys faith-based heritage.

As egregious as Finlands culture of censorship may be, it is not the only Western nation to inflict dictatorial speech restrictions onto its citizens. Canadas recently unanimously passed law, C-4, prevents its citizens from spreading Biblical views on marriage and sexuality. Canadian parents, faith leaders, and citizens who hold traditional views of marriage and sexuality will now face up to 5 years of jail time for providing spiritual guidance to those seeking counseling.

As a horrific assault on civil rights, Canadas egregious policy directly targets faith and has effectively placed targets on the backs of many of its own citizens. Should practitioners trying to assist those calling for help be thrown into jail for their compassion?

Our own country now faces similar concerns, as an American high school football coach lost his job for praying post-game on the field.Americas bedrock founding of religious freedom, enumerated in the First Amendment, has set a longstanding example for the world. By enabling and allowing Big-Tech oligarchs and bureaucrats to undermine the public by canceling and even criminalizing religious speech and expression, we too will be oppressed. While Canadian and European citizens have long accepted the erosion of their religious values, religion, and culture through tyrannical speech codes, Americans cannot follow suit.

Thankfully, several United States Senators have boldly spoken out to condemn Finlands unmerited, totalitarian government interference. Five Senators are urging the newly confirmed U.S. Ambassador-at-Large to monitor the landmark case closely.

The government cannot and should not have the authority to censor scripture, criminalize deeply held convictions, or nefariously target religious beliefs. Our government leaders were never envisioned to engineer society or adversely constrain American citizens socially. Instead, they were intended to serve in a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. How can government be for the people when it actively targets, silences, and criminalizes its own citizens for their religious beliefs?

Americans, will you fight back to protect your voice, faith, and country? The trends across Western democracies are telling, and it may be too late if action is not taken soon.

Originally posted here:
Free Speech and the Bible on global trial - Washington Times

It all seems very reasonable how Polly Hopkins (Parenting should always trump politics, Feb. 24) describes being a mother, standing at a podium asking questions of a publicly elected body in the name of my childs well-being and education . But, how reasonable or smart is it to use the term domestic terrorist as a title in your Twitter name? Mostly, I would ask toward what end?

She reminds the Town Council that domestic terrorist is protected speech, and shes right. She can call herself anything she wants! Unfortunately, some individuals claiming their free-speech rights set aside the responsibility that comes with those rights. Not being appointed to a board is not an infringement on her rights. She made her decision and the council made theirs. They fulfilled their elected responsibility.

I confess to not knowing much about Twitter handles, but I do know that we are suffering in this country from terminal uniqueness being played out under the mantra of parental rights and protected speech. In my opinion, the council was right to not appoint someone to a position who takes pride in self-describing on this Twitter handle, temporary or otherwise, as a domestic terrorist. We are living in a time when elected officials, school board members and teachers are at the mercy, at best, of abusive rhetoric, and, at worst, being threatened with harm. I often wonder if parents claiming their free speech and parental rights consider that their children are listening and watching those who are supposed to be the adults in the room their parents?

So, Polly Hopkins claims that her denial of a seat on a commission is politics, pure and simple, but I would suggest thats exactly where she wanted this to go. We have to buy that her decision to use the term domestic terrorist as a title in her Twitter name is mere happenstance, thoughtless naivete on her part, or her doing exactly what she accuses Mr. Moffitt and Mr. Robbins of, that is, playing at divisive politics. It all seems so reasonable parents using a platform for free speech and standing together on social topics....

Beverly Conti

Westerly

Original post:
Letter: Free speech is a choice that has consequences - The Westerly Sun

DENVER In politics, language matters. It can be inspiring, moving entire crowds to vote or support a position. It can also be ugly or downright demeaning, with mudslinging and name-calling.

In more recent years, some of that language has included calls to silence or even imprison political opponents.

During a recent FEC United meeting in Castle Rock, some called for the imprisonment of Secretary of State Jenna Griswold. Members of the audience chanted, Lock her up, as one speaker questioned the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Give her due process and justice and I think if you are involved in election fraud, you deserve to hang, said Shawn Smith. Sometimes the old ways are the best ways. Some people say Im endorsing violence. Im not endorsing violence. Im saying once you put your hand on a hot stove, you get burned and you ought to see it coming and thats what happens to tyrants.

This is not the first time Griswold has heard language like this before. In December, she asked state lawmakers for $200,000 annually for guards and other security-related measures after receiving escalating threats over her advocacy of elections security.

Nearly two weeks later at a Colorado Conservative Patriot Alliance conference, a gubernatorial candidate used similar language to call for the imprisonment of Governor Jared Polis.

I believe if elected officials break the law, theres one place for them," said Danielle Neuschwanger. "Let me remind them what a jail cell looks like. When Governor Polis is ruining our economy and taking money out of your pockets and lining marijuana companies' pockets, I believe he belongs in a jail cell."

When does free speech go too far?

Despite the harsh language and calls for the imprisonment of political foes, speech like this isnt actually illegal, according to Alan Chen, a law professor at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law.

As extreme as those forms of expression are, they don't actually meet the requirements of showing a true intent to commit an unlawful act of violence, Chen said.

The First Amendment offers vast amounts of protection for free speech, but it does have some limitation. Speech is not considered to be protected when it is considered a "true threat." The U.S. Supreme Court has defined true threats as a serious expression of an intent to commit an unlawful act of violence against a particular individual or a group of individuals.

Obviously, many of these people aren't really in a position to imprison or arrest public officials, so that makes the threat less realistic and therefore less of a concern, Chen said.

Something else that is not considered protected speech is incitement, when someone uses language to encourage or incite another person to commit an unlawful act. It can be difficult to prove intent versus political hyperbole, though.

However, political rhetoric like this is not necessarily new in the context of the countrys political history.

We forget that heated political rhetoric has been going on since at least the late 1700s in the United States, Chen said. Throughout history, politicians have used hyperbole, exaggeration, and even something that sounds dangerous to sort of make their views known.

Just because its legal, is it right?

While the language may be legal, both Democratic and Republican state parties have come out against threatening rhetoric.

As chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, I have condemned any violence or threats of violence for the purpose of political means, said Kristi Burton Brown, chairwoman of the Colorado Republican Party.

Burton Brown says the voters she has spoken with want less rhetoric from both sides of the aisle and more focus on the issues. She also says she doesnt believe threatening language is an effective political tool to get elected, but says people from both sides have participated in the harsh language in the past.

Our stance is violence should never be a part of political discourse, said Howard Chou, vice chair of the Colorado Democratic Party. Coming out with a violent type of attack or calling other people to be hanged, we're going down a slippery slope that's really going to incite a kind of discourse ... that's very un-American. It's very disturbing, and it's going to lead to a trend of more violent action.

However, political science professors say they have seen this type of vitriol ramp up in recent months and years, not only with threatening language, but also with attempts to delegitimize other candidates.

You don't just run against someone, you lock them up. You try and essentially just take people out of society, and that's a dangerous area, said Seth Masket, a professor of political science and director of the Center on American Politics at the University of Denver. All those are things that are just sort of warning signs that lead to democratic decline. They lead to elections being increasingly contested.

Masket says sometimes political figures will use this language strategically just to rally their base. However, that rhetoric from politicians can sometimes inspire some of their supporters to try to take matters into their own hands. In 2017, a left-leaning activist shot U.S. Congressman Steve Scalise and several others during a Republican baseball team practice. In 2020, a group of far-right men plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer but were caught.

Whether it's treason and hanging or violence aimed at particular public officials, it does have the potential to become reality, said Robert Preuhs, chair of the political science department at Metropolitan State University of Denver.

There is a balance between free speech and threats. Preuhs believes protected speech is an important piece of any democracy, but it comes with downsides.

It's fundamental part of what establishes a democracy, but at the same time there's always that risk, he said.

With the 2022 midterm elections getting closer, the political partisanship and harsh language is likely to increase as both sides vie to get their candidates elected.

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As some call for political foes to be locked up, where's the line between free speech and threats? - The Denver Channel

For the past year, history professor Michael Phillips has been warning about a right-wing purge taking place at Collin College, led by administrators angling to remove progressive voices from the Texas school. Then he himself was purged.

Last month, Phillips, an award-winning professor of history, was called to a meeting about his impending removal from the institution hed taught at for the past fourteen years. As he recalls, he was offered a deal: he and college leadership would craft a narrative that he had left voluntarily, and theyd help him find a job to move on to, giving him a graceful exit. He refused. Not long after, he was told he would not be employed come May 15. Hes now the fourth professor to be fired from the public community college in Texas over free speech issues.

The firing of Phillips and his colleagues is first and foremost a story about administrative abuse at Collin College, where administrators have used the deliberate lack of tenure to single out and punish faculty who are too outspoken. But its also part of a larger story were seeing unfold across the country, of the Right working with increasing ferocity to stamp out what they see as progressivism in education, trampling over free speech rights in the process.

Phillips had been clashing with administrators for some time before he was fired. Phillips immediately butted heads with now president H. Neil Matkin when he was a finalist for the position in 2015. Concerned that Matkin had received degrees from an unaccredited college run by the Worldwide Church of God (now known as Grace Communion International) described by one former adherent as a white supremacist doomsday cult that taught that God approved of slavery and wanted white people to rule the world he recalls confronting Matkin privately, asking him about his attitudes to matters like interracial dating and evolution.

According to Phillips, Matkin got upset. For Matkins part, hed later complain that Phillips had come to the conclusion the church was racist and that therefore I was racist.

Two years later, Phillips authored several op-eds for the Dallas News calling for the removal of Confederate statues in the city, the second one getting the signature of one hundred religious leaders, activists, and scholars, including nine Collin College faculty.

They faced immediate pushback. Suzanne Jones, a professor of education at Collin, was asked by administrators to remove Collins name from her signature on the op-ed, according to a lawsuit she later filed. Phillips says he, too, was asked by his campus provost not to use the colleges name, fearing it would hurt the colleges image and make locals feel bad, since their ancestors were Confederates.

To her, the default face of a Collin College student and a resident of the county was a white face, he says now. It didnt occur to her that black people mattered, and maybe black people wouldnt think it was a bad thing.

The next clash came after the 2019 El Paso shooting, whose perpetrator had attended Collin College. Matkin instructed faculty not to talk about the incident, and both Phillips and another faculty member independently recalled Matkin then announcing to those assembled the shooters grade point average (a violation of federal law).

Soon after, Phillips was quoted in the Washington Post report on the shooter, mentioning the presence of racist fliers on the Collin campus and the DallasFort Worth region in recent years, fliers whose existence was a matter of public record. Despite viewing the gag order on the subject as unconstitutional Professors have a right to talk about matters of public concern, he says Phillips had thought he had stayed within its bounds, having refused to discuss the shooter and offering only to talk about the historical context, about which he had written a prominent book. Nevertheless, he recalls being called in by unhappy administrators as a result.

But it was the arrival of the pandemic that sent events hurtling toward their endgame. We had very cordial correspondence about one issue or another over the years, former history professor Lora Burnett recalls about her relationship with Matkin. He never had a cross word for me, and I not to him, until COVID.

Matkin had taken a distinctly blas approach to COVID-19, to the point that even hes since admitted there were things that I did say early on that werent terribly helpful. He claimed the pandemic had been blown utterly out of proportion, that reports about it were too sensational, that deaths had been clearly inflated, and that Texans were one hundred times more likely to die in car crashes, which he later acknowledged was not true.

He resisted faculty requests to do remote learning, in line with neighboring institutions, and kept in-person classes going through the 2020 fall semester. A seventy-year-old nursing professor died of the virus a few months after that, not long after one of her students had tested positive. Her family is convinced she caught it while teaching.

According to Phillips, he was admonished for several tweets obliquely critical of the colleges pandemic policy on his personal Twitter account, one suggesting the college didnt care about its staffs health and safety, which he was asked to delete. The other described a dream he had of people seated together without masks at a college, wondering if that was the scenario coming in the fall.

The final straw came a year later, when faculty were told by administrators that staff and faculty were forbidden from even recommending to students that they wear masks voluntarily. The reasoning given was Texas governor Greg Abbotts ban on mask mandates even though Abbotts later order banning vaccine mandates strongly encouraged as a matter of personal responsibility that Texans abide by various pandemic mitigation practices.

Phillips took a photo of the PowerPoint slide outlining the policy and posted it on social media, before objecting to the board of trustees that faculty shouldnt be withholding critical information from students. Days later, he was given a discipline warning, then told his contract would not be renewed.

Theyre now retaliating against the most vocal, most principled faculty member, and the most vocal supporter of the rest of us who were disciplined, says Burnett.

As Burnetts words suggests, Collins clampdown on speech goes well beyond Phillips. Four faculty have lost their jobs now for exercising their First Amendment rights, a gross breach of the principle of academic freedom.

Burnett first entered the crosshairs when a post on her personal social media page became the subject of a right-wing cancel culture campaign. Her tweet calling for the moderator of the 2020 vice presidential debate to talk over Mike Pence until he shuts his little demon mouth up was seized on by right-wing media and organizations, leading Republican state representative Jeff Leach to text Matkin, asking if Burnett was paid with taxpayer dollars. Im aware of the situation Jeff and will deal with it, Matkin replied, adding, Appreciate you. Good luck in November friend.

Burnett further drew Matkins ire by tweeting criticisms of the colleges pandemic policies. In February of last year, Leach tweeted out that her firing was BIG WIN, unwittingly revealing both Collin leaderships plans to fire her and that he was apparently privy to them. Later that month, she was informed the college would not be renewing her contract. Shes since won a $70,000 settlement from the college plus payment of her legal fees.

Audra Heaslip was a humanities professor who had worked at the college for fifteen years, nearly ten of them as full-time faculty. She says she felt morally compelled to bring up staff concerns about COVID policy in 2020, when people started texting her, asking her to speak up.

There was already an environment of fear where you dont ever ask questions or speak up against anything, she says.

Heaslip recalls putting together a document of peer-reviewed research on the virus in summer 2020 and asking people to add their comments to it. She hoped it would start a conversation instead, she says, Matkin took it as a hostile move, referring to the document as a set of demands. In January 2021, she was told the president had declined to renew her contract.

Suzanne Jones, who had earlier run afoul of administrators for signing her name to Phillipss op-ed against Confederate monuments, also sparked anger by pushing back against the schools lax COVID policy in a Facebook post. But Jones says she suspects it was being on the faculty council when it wrote a resolution asking for safety precautions at the start of the pandemic that really drew administrators ire. She was accused by administrators of going outside normal channels of communication and learned the same month she, too, would not have her contract renewed, ending a twenty-year career at the college.

It wasnt always constitutionally protected speech that was the issue. Photography professor Byrd Williams had been at Collin for nearly thirty years when he says leadership moved to push him out. They started getting rid of all the people who had an opinion, plus the people in the highest pay rate, he says. They told me we can hire two people for what we pay you. Meanwhile, English professor Barbara Hanson was denied a multiyear contract for mysterious reasons, with school officials citing her application for two administrative positions at the college and cherry-picked student evaluations.

Then there was the Texas Faculty Association (TFA), the closest thing to a higher education union in the right-to-work state an advocacy group, rather than a labor organization with the right to strike. The ousted faculty note that Jones and Heaslip were both local officers of the Collin chapter of TFA, as was Phillips, who stepped in when the latter was removed. Joness misuse of the colleges name on a website associated with the TFA was specifically mentioned by Matkin as one of the reasons she was pushed out.

He certainly didnt choose us out of faculty council, because there were a lot of people on there who were a lot more vocal, says Jones. To me, it looks like they dont want this advocacy group or union existing.

Matkin is an obvious lightning rod for outrage over this spate of firings. Besides his conservative connections and the leading role he played in ousting the various professors, Matkin had stirred up accusations of unprofessionalism through incidents like revealing the El Paso shooters GPA, and his tendency to make offensive anatomical jokes about African Americans. But thats not the whole story.

It seems like the root of the problem is in the board of trustees, says Heaslip.

The leadership has a very pronounced conservative Republican slant, says Burnett.

Trustees include executives from health insurance company Cigna, corporate consulting firms, and a medical technology firm. But ousted faculty typically point to Bob Collins, whose reelection endorsement page as trustee lists the Collin County GOP, Collin County Conservative Republicans, and the conservative organizations of We the People Allen and McKinney First PAC, which says its membership dues go toward fund[ing] the conservative movement locally. It also lists a collection of Republican state legislators, including Jeff Leach, the lawmaker who had pushed Matkin to act against Burnett for her tweet criticizing Pence.

Collins, a founding trustee of the college, made clear in a 2015 speech why it uses the system of rolling contracts for its faculty, which have made it so easy for administrators to push those like Phillips out.

Collin College does not have tenure. Thats by design, he said:

Where you have tenure is where you tend to have a self-promoting faculty. So, with the tenure system, you tend to have the ultraliberal, anti-capitalism socialistic professors want to hire more just like them. So, we dont have that here. We have a contract system.

Collins would later defend Matkin when he placed a bowl on his head to mimic a yarmulke and called himself Cary Israel, the previous, Jewish president of Collin College. Its a shame we cant do things like that and not have people get offended, Collins said at the time. Yet it appears both Collins and Matkins defense of free speech only goes so far: while racist jokes may not cross the line for them, progressive politics, pandemic mitigation, and workplace organizing do.

The Collin College saga is a free speech and First Amendment scandal. Its a violation of academic freedom. Its an incident of union busting. And its just one case of many of these basic rights being trampled at educational institutions across the country, even as right-wing media and organizations point to campus protests as an authoritarian threat while ignoring or even cheering on flagrant abuses by college administrators.

The biggest loser is the college itself, which has not only seen tens of thousands of dollars wasted on settlements with fired staff but has lost faculty who were recognized both within and outside the college for their quality of teaching.

Were really concerned about the students at the college, because most of the people that they let go are the longtime professors, says Heaslip.

And now at the center of it is Michael Phillips, who Lora Burnett calls the William Lloyd Garrison of Collin College and who is joining his ousted colleagues in filing a lawsuit against the college. Yet even if he wins, as Burnett points out, the threatening cloud the colleges leadership has conjured above the facultys head will remain.

If they can get rid of Michael Phillips, who else is going to dare raise their voice?

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At a Texas Community College, the Attack on Free Speech Is Coming From the Right - Jacobin magazine