First Amendment News

Riana Pfefferkorn of The Center for Internet and Society, May 21, 2019, has failed to obtain court records on surveillance  in the Northern District of California even though the public is entitled to the records that are under seal but no longer need to be sealed. The judge ruled there was no First Amendment right to the records. In Pfefferkorn’s favor, the judge rejected the government’s argument that administrative burdens did not cancel out a constitutional

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a claim of an Alaska man who said he was arrested as retaliation for exercising his free speech rights. The court said the police could arrest someone for probable cause free from threat of retaliatory claims. The court reversed a finding by the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals that probable cause did not rule out a claim of retaliatory arrest. (WRAL.com, May 28, 2019, by Ariane de Vogue and

The San Francisco Police Chief William Scott defended a police raid of a journalist’s home by contending that free-lance journalist Bryan Carmody was the subject of a criminal investigation for possibly paying a city employee for a police report on the sudden death of Public Defender Jeff Adachi.  (San Jose Mercury News, May 21, 2019. by Thomas Peele) The police regarded the report as part of an ongoing investigation so not a public document, but

The federal courts are stepping into a prominent role in deciding whether  the Trump administration can wall out requests by Congress and others for information regarding President Donald Trump’s Russia connection, financial dealings and alleged obstruction of justice. Transparency got a boost Monday from U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta who ruled that President Donald Trump’s accountant had to submit Trump’s financial records to the House Oversight Committee. Mehta rejected arguments that the quest for

The 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals turned down a challenge to a federal law banning foreign nationals from donating to state and local election campaigns. The Supreme Court ruled in 2012 on the ban, but the decision only dealt with federal elections. The case involved a political consultant in a San Diego mayor’s race whose work was financed by a Mexican national and real estate developer with substantial interests in the U.S. but who