Commentary: Does the Legislature Have Constitutional Authority to Pass Governor Lee’s Call for a Red Flag Law?

On April 11, 2023, Governor Bill Lee called for the Tennessee Legislature to respond to the public’s emotional response to the Covenant School murders by enacting a law to make sure mentally ill people do not have access to firearms. He did not use the term “Red Flag” but that is the correct label for the kind of law that Governor Lee described as a “new protective order”.

Tennessee’s Legislature has a super majority of Republicans. Many of those Republicans have campaigned as strong Second Amendment supporters and continue to claim that they are. Many of them have told their constituents that they would never support a “Red Flag” law. Some may have answered candidate surveys or signed pledges assuring the voters that they would never support a “Red Flag” law in Tennessee. Now Republican Governor Lee calls on them to violate those promises and assurances and to pass a “Red Flag” law.

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Goldwater Institute Reacts to Arizona Supreme Court Decision That Respects Due Process

The Arizona Supreme Court released an opinion in the Legacy Foundation (Legacy) v. Clean Elections Commission (CEC) Thursday, which the Goldwater Institute (GI) celebrated as a victory for checks and balances.

“State bureaucrats cannot simply decide the reach of their own authority,” said GI Vice President of Legal Affairs Timothy Sandefur. “When bureaucrats—who are often not answerable to voters at all—have the power to make the rules, investigate infractions, and punish people for violating those rules, that authority can undermine our most important constitutional values and threaten individual rights.”

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Lawsuit Filed Against City of Phoenix for Suppressing Speech During Super Bowl

The Arizona-based Goldwater Institute (GI) announced that a lawsuit had been filed against the city of Phoenix Wednesday, alleging that it is violating the first amendment rights of some citizens leading up to the Super Bowl in February.

“Hosting sporting events should not come at the cost of surrendering fundamental rights. But by giving the NFL a blank check to censor the messages people can share, the city of Phoenix is trampling on hundreds of business owners and thousands of residents’ right to communicate with the public on their own property,” said GI Staff Attorney John Thorpe in a statement emailed to The Arizona Sun Times.

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Commentary: For Democrats and Due Process, It’s Now or Never

The FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago represents the logical next step in the left’s ongoing effort to destroy Donald Trump. The raid also evinces Democrats’ spiral of worry: A successful Trump return, once unthinkable to them, is looking more possible by the day. To stop it, Democrats and their anti-Trump Republican allies are prepared to shred every last norm of American due process.

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Andy Biggs Speaks Against Damaging Pro-Abortion Protests, Saying They ‘Have Jeopardized Public Safety’

Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ-05) recently spoke against the pro-abortion protests occurring across the country that have caused damage to state and public buildings, demanding that the Department of Justice (DOJ) take action against what he calls ‘domestic terrorism.’

“I am a staunch supporter of our First Amendment and peaceful protest, but the pro-abortion protests related to the Dobbs v. Jackson decision have jeopardized public safety,” Biggs told the Arizona Sun Times via email. “These types of activists have besieged state capitol buildings, pregnancy centers, homes of Supreme Court Justices, and those who support the pro-life movement. I co-sponsored Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s legislation to classify the recent actions of two pro-abortion groups–Jane’s Revenge and Ruth Sent Us–as domestic terrorism while also co-signing letters to Attorney General Merrick Garland that demand a response from the Department of Justice.”

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Biden Administration Proposes Rule to Replace Trump Administration’s Title IX Sex Discrimination Policy in Schools

Taking aim once again at the Trump administration, the Biden education department released its proposed rule to revise how Title IX sex discrimination regulations will be enforced in education.

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said in a statement Thursday his department was releasing the proposed rules in celebration of the 50th anniversary of Title IX.

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Biden’s Office for Civil Rights Pick Questioned on Her Position on Campus Due Process

Catherine Lhamon’s (right) work in President Barack Obama’s administration on Title IX issues may have won her praise from liberal groups and organizations representing alleged and confirmed victims of sexual assault, but it drew criticism from the ranking member of the Senate’s education committee.

President Joe Biden has nominated Lhamon to lead the federal Office for Civil Rights in the Department of Education, the same position she held under Obama. But Senate Republicans and due-process advocates have questioned her position on the rights of accused students.

Republican Senator Richard Burr said he is concerned that Lhamon “will charge ahead unraveling significant pieces of the previous administration’s Title IX rules.” He made the comments during a July 13 Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee meeting.

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Biden Orders Examination of Trump Era Due Process Rights on College Campuses

President Joe Biden called for an examination of collegiate due process protections enacted under former President Donald Trump’s administration in a Monday executive order.

The president announced his “Executive Order on Guaranteeing an Educational Environment Free from Discrimination on the Basis of Sex, Including Sexual Orientation” on International Women’s Day, calling on the Education Department to evaluate a Title IX regulation issued under the Trump administration that encouraged due process for those accused of campus sexual misconduct.

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The Tennessee Star Report Discusses Legislation to Put Guardrails on Community Oversight Boards with Special Guest State Rep. Mike Curcio

On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Gill and Leahy talked about the current oversight boards and the need for ‘guard rails’ to prevent mismanagement by unelected officials that may wield political power fueled by an axe to grind. The three men went into more detail towards the end of the segment touching upon the importance of police officers maintaining the same rights as citizens who are entitled the element of due process… “innocent until proven guilty.” Gill: Michael Curcio is a state representative. He’s a chairman of the judiciary committee of the state house and he and his fellow legislators are trying to put some guard rails on this new community oversight board process that the city of Nashville is trying to impose. And Representative Curcio good to have you with us my friend! Curcio: Hey glad to be here this morning. Thanks for having me. Gill: You know, we are already seeing a lot of reports of police officers in Nashville deciding that they are going to retire if they’re at a certain age or…

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Iowa Employee Fired for Signing Emails ‘In Christ’ Loses Court Battle

An Iowa state employee who sued his former employer after being fired for signing his emails “In Christ” lost his court battle Wednesday. According to the Sioux City Journal, a federal jury found Wednesday that Michael Mial, a former employee of the Cherokee Mental Health Institute’s Civil Commitment Unit for Sexual Offenders, failed to demonstrate that his employer didn’t accommodate his religious practices. The ruling puts an end to Mial’s two-year court battle, which started in January 2017 when he filed a religious discrimination suit against his former supervisors. Mial claims that he was told his “deeply held religious beliefs are great for helping” patients, but was then asked to keep his beliefs out of his work, and was later fired. The lawsuit argued that his use of “In Christ” in the signature line of his emails was protected by the First Amendment, and did not violate a state endorsement of religion, but was rather a “minuscule accommodation on behalf of the Plaintiff and his protected beliefs.” “By firing Mial and by limiting their employment to persons whom agree with the organization’s religious beliefs, or lack thereof, and the stifling of the expression of religious viewpoints, Defendants have violated and…

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Commentary: The U.S. Constitution Narrowly Prevailed Over Mob Rule And Character-Assassination

On October 6, 2018, now-Associate Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh was formally confirmed by the U.S. Senate — in a rare Saturday session — with a slender vote of 50 yeas and 48 nays in the 100-member body. Both of Tennessee’s Senators, Republicans Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker, cast their votes in favor of Kavanaugh joining the highest court in the land. The last time that someone gained membership onto the High Court by such a close margin was on May 12, 1881, when Thomas Stanley Matthews (nominated by President James Garfield) squeaked by with 24 yeas and 23 nays in the Senate.  Matthews went on to distinguish himself on the Court as a foe of racial discrimination when he wrote the Opinion in the 1886 case of Yick Wo v. Hopkins, striking down the City of San Francisco’s then-policies of restricting the ability of Chinese immigrants in that city — and placing extraneous procedural obstacles in their path — to establish businesses there, thus infringing upon the federal Constitution’s 14th Amendment. A short time after this past Saturday’s 50-48 vote, Chief Justice John Roberts administered the official oath to Kavanaugh as the 114th Justice of the Supreme Court, thereby…

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Commentary: The Left’s Pattern of Overlooking Due Process

by David Harsanyi   The notion that certain Americans are pre-emptively guilty of wrongdoing, whether there’s any corroborating evidence to back up an accusation or not, isn’t reserved for conservatives who happen to be in contention for a Supreme Court seat. In the hierarchy of progressive values, due process is a bottom dweller. Over the past decade, you could see the illiberalism evolving on college campuses, where Democrats subverted basic standards of justice. It was the Obama administration that demanded schools judge cases of alleged sexual assaults under a “clear and convincing evidence” standard rather than on a “preponderance of evidence” standard, allowed accusers to appeal “not guilty” findings, and permitted the meting out of punishment before any investigation was even conducted, among other big problems. Democrats are simply shepherding those corrosive standards into the real world. Another area of American life where we continue to see egregious attacks on the presumption of innocence is gun ownership. You might remember that a couple of years ago, Democrats engaged in a much-covered congressional “sit-in” to support legislation that would have stripped Americans on secret government watchlists—hundreds of thousands of people who had never been accused, much less convicted, of any crime—of their…

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Commentary: The Michael Flynn Guilty Plea Stinks to High-Heaven

Tennessee Star

Former Trump National Security Adviser Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn pled guilty to providing false information to FBI agent in December and the more we learn about the events leading up to that plea, the more it stinks to high-heaven. Byron York’s recent article at the Washington Examiner reveals that then-FBI DIrector James Comey testified that the agents who conducted the interview of Flynn did not think he had lied to them.

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Knoxville Appeals Court Rules $250 ‘DUI Fee’ Unconstitutional

The Criminal Court of Appeals in Knoxville ruled Tuesday that Tennessee’s state law requiring every person convicted of a DUI via blood or breath tests pay a $250 fee to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is unconstitutional. According to the 28-page decision, the fee violates due process and puts into question the integrity of the TBI forensic department’s test results, which receives the monies into its ‘Intoxicant Testing Fund.’ The fee system, the ruling says, creates a monetary incentive for forensic scientists through continued employment, salaries, equipment and training. In addition to the named defendant, Rosemary L. Decosimo, some 20 individuals joined the case, all of whom were charged with DUIs after they provided blood or breath samples, and each would have been subject to paying the $250 fee if convicted. “While we acknowledge that TBI forensic scientists could lose their jobs if they falsify test results and these falsifications are discovered, we also recognize that forensic scientists would most certainly lose their jobs if funding for their positions disappears, a result of which these forensic scientists are no doubt well aware,” the opinion states. Initially, in 2005, the “DUI fee” was set at $100, but in 2010, the fee was raised to…

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Commentary: Tennessee’s Civil Asset Forfeiture Laws Must Be Reformed Now

The United States Constitution, specifically the 5th Amendment, states that we shall not be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law. Tennessee’s current laws regarding civil asset forfeiture include allowing money to be confiscated from people based solely on suspicion, with no evidence of wrong doing at all. So if you’re pulled over in Tennessee, do your best to look innocent and broke; emphasis on broke. Tennessee legislators need a refresher on the U.S. Constitution, or they may just need to read the constitution for their first time. Should a suspicious policeman really meet the threshold of due process of law? Only in the Twilight Zone or some third world dictatorship. When a police officer’s job depends on how much he is able to confiscate, which is the case in some police organizations in Tennessee, officers tend to become the suspicious type. Innocent until proven guilty might occasionally still work for us, but not for our cash. Many times money is confiscated from people by police with the person having his property seized never being charged with a crime at all. People having only a few thousand dollars seized might well find it more expensive to…

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