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First Amendment Coalition

Veteran First Amendment Lawyer Glen A. Smith Named FAC’s First Legal Fellow

Veteran First Amendment Lawyer Named FAC’s First Legal Fellow

Glen A. Smith, a lawyer with more than 30 years of experience in 1st Amendment and media law, appointed as the inaugural FAC Legal Fellow. [Read More ]

Join Us for a Discussion on Silicon Valley & Regulation of Online Speech

Will tech giants’ battle with trolls jeopordize free speech? Help us tackle that question at the Digital Townsquare. [RSVP Now]

FAC Victory in “Reverse CPRA”: Court Orders Disclosure of Records

The ruling ordered Milpitas to release documents relating to allegations of serious misconduct by former city manager Tom Williams. [Read More]

First Amendment News

Opinion /Coalition News/1st Amendment News/Asked & Answered

On Access
Opinion from Executive Director David Snyder

The Hannity Reveal Was Huge News — But Everyone Missed The Most Important Point

BY DAVID SNYDER — When a federal judge ordered President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, to disclose in open court the fact that he considers Fox News host Sean Hannity a client, the Trump Era outrage-industrial complex shifted into high gear. Seeing evidence of some nefarious Deep State plot… ∞

The Tyranny of the Minority: A Post-Charlottesville Theory of the First Amendment

BY DAVID SNYDER—The framers of the U.S. Constitution understood the protections of the First Amendment to be a bulwark against the “tyranny of the majority” — a shield to protect those with unpopular views against oppression by a popularly elected majority. President Donald Trump has turned this concept on its… ∞

Memo to Future Historians of the Trump Presidency: Good Luck. You’ll Need It.

BY DAVID SNYDER --Tucked into a February 13 Washington Post article about internal chaos at the White House is a stunning sentence, slipped in almost as an aside: White House “[s]taffers, meanwhile, are so fearful of being accused of talking to the media that some have resorted to a secret… ∞

First Amendment News
Headlines from Across the Country

Immigration authorities succeeding in thwarting free press covering immigration crisis

Jacob Weindling reports a series of tweets in Paste, July 18, 2018, by journalist Molly Crabapple showing the layers of obstruction and red tape that reporters face in trying to gain access to a detention center. "Soon enough," writes Crabapple in one tweet, "the journalist gets tired of driving out… ∞

News media in race to combat crippling deception

On top of all the challenges in the Trump era of coping with hostility and shrinking revenues, the news media is facing ever escalating fakes of videos, photos and audio files. "The problem for newsrooms is threefold: how to identify sophisticated manipulations, how to educate audiences without inducing apathy and… ∞

Press conferences take back seat in the bus during Trump administration

Reporters are complaining that under the Trump administration, press briefings have become rare, brief and uninformative. Some believe that the failure to hold briefings reflects the disarray in the White House, the conflicts between the president's tweets and what others in the administration are saying and disrespect of the press… ∞

Coalition News
FAC News & Initiatives

Veteran First Amendment Lawyer Glen A. Smith Named FAC’s First Legal Fellow

The First Amendment Coalition is pleased to announce the appointment of Glen A. Smith, a lawyer with more than 30 years of experience in First Amendment and media law, as the inaugural FAC Legal Fellow. Smith comes to FAC with a deep and widely varied background in media litigation, including… ∞

Ed Chapuis, Katherine Rowlands and Juliet Williams Join FAC Board of Directors

The First Amendment Coalition is delighted to announce the appointment of three new members to its Board of Directors, all working journalists who have made substantial contributions to their craft and to the cause of government transparency in California and beyond: Ed Chapuis, news director for KGTV-10 in San Diego;… ∞

Remembering FAC Founding Father and California Journalism Giant, Frank McCulloch

Frank McCulloch, a giant in California journalism, played an important role in the founding of FAC in 1988. McCulloch was a key editor who helped transition a small Freedom of Information committee, sponsored by the California Newspaper Publishers Association, into an independent organization of journalists, attorneys and FOI/First Amendment experts who would… ∞

Asked & Answered
Questions Answered by FAC Lawyers

A&A: PRA Requested Documents Withheld Due to “Attorney-Client Privilige”

Q: Cal Fire claims to have released all documents related to a request with the exception of “documents that are protected by attorney-client privilege.” Is there a way to find out what was redacted/withheld? A: It appears that Cal Fire invoked the attorney-client privilege exemption in order to withhold the documents. In general, California law […]

A&A: Is Artist’s Conviction for Pornographic Drawings Legal?

Q: I draw, from my imagination, pornographic scenes that I sometimes distribute to consenting adults. I have been convicted for possessing pornography for having these drawings. Is my conviction legal? A: Visual arts and entertainment constitute protected forms of expression under the First Amendment. See White v. City of Sparks, 500 F.3d 953 (9th Cir. 2007); Ward v. Rock […]

A&A: Charged as “disorderly person” for asserting my right to free speech by yelling at protesters

Q: I was recently charged as a “disorderly person” after yelling out of my car window, “get off my lawn you fucking faggots,” as I passed people engaged in a protest. Is what I said protected by the First Amendment? A: Speech that insults someone because of race, gender or sexual orientation is understood in general parlance as “hate speech.” […]

Legal Hotline

The Legal Hotline gives users quick, free access to FAC’s lawyers for questions about access to public records; your right to attend government meetings; access to court documents and proceedings; and first amendment protections for freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

Asked & Answered

A searchable database of questions posed by users like you about their rights under public records laws, open government laws, and first amendment safeguards that have been answered by FAC’s attorneys.

Access to Records

FAC’s incomparable resources for using California and federal to obtain public records, including FAC’s CPRA Primer; the text of the CPRA, and a template for a CPRA request letter for use in requesting public records

Access to Meetings

Links to all of FAC’S resources for California’s open-meetings law, the Brown Act, including our Brown Act Primer on how the law works; the text of the The Ralph M. Brown Act, and a sample “Cure & Correct” demand letter to report a violation of the law.

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