First Amendment News

Prominent international companies are enabling false information about climate change in advertising on YouTube. The activist group Avaaz found that over 100 brands were involved including Sansung, L’Oreal and Decathlon. The brands were unaware that their ads were running on sites offering bogus climate information. (The Guardian, January 16, 2020, by Alex Hern) Avaaz revealed that one-fifth of ads on false climate videos were from environmental groups like Greenpeace and the World Wildlife Fund. It

Even a conservative Republic senator finds the restrictions on the press during the Senate impeachment trial unacceptable. Senator John Kennedy said it was a mistake to limit reporters trying to ask questions of senators, making them stand in press pens on the second floor of the Senate. (The Hill, January 15, 2020, by Jordain Carney) Reporters are complaining that as the impeachment begins Capitol police are even interrupting interviews on topics unrelated to impeachment as

The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upheld the right of Joseph Patrick Cuviello to use a bullhorn in front of a California amusement park to protest the treatment of animals in the park. The court found the city’s ban unnecessarily broad and the protest area a public forum. (Metropolitan News-Enterprise, December 11, 2019, by a MetNews Staff Writer) Asheen Phansey was fired by Babson College in Massachusetts after the adjunct professor posted what he

BuzzFeed News compiled a list of 17 and counting reports spreading false and unverified accounts about Iran’s missile attack aimed at U.S. forces in Iraq. Many involve images from other events at other times and countries but claim to be about the Iraq attack. Others are factually incorrect including reports of casualties and of Americans receiving draft notices. (BuzzFeed News, January 8, 2020, by Jane Lytvynenko and Craig Silverman) The doctored Biden video depicting a

It’s difficult to choose a single highlight of President Donald Trump’s bad treatment of the press in 2019 there being so many. Journalists have been shut out of key events, denied daily White House briefings and garnered 21 tweets from the president calling them “the enemy of the people.” Trump has succeeded in maiming public trust in the press while bashing the concept of verifiable facts, a vital part of the foundation of any democracy.