There are substantive debates to be had over the scope of that power, and whether state action is necessary to prevent monopolies or more strongly regulate the use of private data. Internet-communications companies have a tremendous amount of power to shape public discourse, power they have often wielded irresponsibly. This position reverses the purpose of the First Amendment, turning an individual right of freedom of expression into the right of the state to silence its critics. The First Amendment was explicitly written to protect the right of citizens to express opposition to their leaders it says that Congress “shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” But to the president, criticism of his falsehoods is a violation of his free-speech rights. In retaliation, Trump signed an executive order yesterday afternoon directing the federal government to “reconsider the scope” of Section 230, a provision of federal law that shields companies from liability for content posted by their users. It merely appended additional context showing that the president’s claim was false. On Tuesday, the social-media company Twitter added a label to one of the president’s tweets, which falsely declared that mail-in ballots would be “substantially fraudulent,” urging users to “get the facts about mail-in voting.” Twitter did not ban Trump from the platform, or censor his tweet, although it would have been fully within its rights to do so, and in accordance with its own terms of service. Garrett Epps: The important First Amendment principle now at riskĪs absurd as it may sound, Palin’s bizarre interpretation of the First Amendment has now been adopted by the president of the United States. You have the right to speak, and others have the right to praise, mock, or ignore you as they see fit. The First Amendment, commentators on the right and the left pointed out, protects the freedom of speech, not the freedom from criticism. Palin’s remarks were widely ridiculed at the time.
“If convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations,” Palin said, “then I don’t know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media.”
#Trump freedom of spress free#
Just days before the 2008 election, the Republican vice-presidential nominee told a conservative radio host that the press was trampling on her right to free speech. There’s also an International Women’s Day concert in Cincinnati on Saturday and Sunday, and a women’s rights rally in Lexington, Virginia, on Thursday.Sarah Palin knew her rights had been violated. Students from the University of Wyoming have arranged a march on Sunday to support the trans community in the face of Trump’s repeal of federal guidance around bathroom protections.
#Trump freedom of spress professional#
If you can, make a donation to the Committee to Protect Journalists or the Society of Professional Journalists. For phone numbers and easy-to-follow scripts, head over to 5 Calls. The New York Times has an incredible piece on the Obama administration’s efforts to preserve evidence of Russian hacking.Ĭheck out the Buzzfeed News piece on how, four days after condemning the use of anonymous sources, Trump asked to be quoted as a “senior administration official.”Ĭall your representatives and ask them to fight for a special prosecutor to investigate Jeff Sessions. For an uninformed public, it doesn’t much matter either way. Without a free press, there can be no democracy. All Americans must remember that the goal of journalism is to empower citizens with facts. In this moment, access to information and the truth itself is being called into question. Regardless of who you voted for, or even whether you voted at all, it is crucial that every last citizen remain vigilantly informed and, above all else, insist upon safeguarding the freedoms of the press. And that leads to the most powerful asset of all: a lack of accountability. Through situations like Spicer’s gaggle, the Trump administration ends up bewildering an already exhausted public into simply not caring. The doomsday scenario here is a state-run media operated by an authoritarian regime, but apathy is currently a greater risk than that dystopia.
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