First Amendment News

In ruling for the baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple, the U.S. Supreme Court said the Colorado Civil Right Commission had erred in their ruling against the baker but found that state laws forbidding discrimination based on sexual discrimination were valid. The court did not define the boundaries between the right to equal service in establishments open to the public and the right of business owners to refuse service

Ukraine’s secret service staged reports of the murder of Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko to foil an assassination plot. The staging raised many questions about its necessity and circumstances. The CPJ said it was relieved that Babchenko was alive and perhaps saved by the staging but was alarmed by the possible undermining of public trust in journalists. (Committee to Protect Journalists, May 30, 2018, by Nina Ognianova) Sophie Pinkham, The Guardian, May 31, 2018, was less

Experts agree that an employee expressing repugnant, including racist, comments on the social media may be fired for expressing views that conflict with the values of their company. Roseanne Barr has little recourse after ABC fired her for a racist Twitter post. And unless the National Football League’s player union negotiates more leeway for players, they have to comply with the new NFL policy that requires them to stand during the playing of the national

The U.S. Supreme Court denied a review of a First Amendment challenge of San Francisco’s ban on outdoor advertising that only allowed signs at the advertisers’ business addresses. A federal district judge ruled that the Supreme Court ruling that overturned an Arizona town’s limits on church ads did not apply in that it is permissible under the Constitution to place greater limits on commercial speech. The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of appeals upheld the district

Critics of President Donald Trump are concerned that his conspiracy theories, Spygate his latest, are succeeding in diverting attention from his culpability and eroding public trust in crucial institutions such as the FBI, the press and Special Consul Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election.  “Conspiracies, by definition, are things that others do to you,” said Gwenda Blair, a Trump biographer. “You’re being duped; you’re being fooled; the world is laughing