Tag: First Amendment

SCOTUS Holds Law Making It Illegal to ‘Encourage or Induce’ Illegal Immigration Does Not Violate First Amendment

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The Supreme Court upheld a law that makes it a crime to “encourage or induce” illegal immigration, rejecting the argument that it violates the First Amendment.

The case, United States v. Hansen, stems from Helaman Hansen’s 2017 conviction for running a program advertising a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants through “adult adoption,” which earned him more $1.8 million between 2012 and 2016. Though it affirmed Hansen’s convictions on mail and wire fraud charges, the Ninth Circuit held that the law behind his two counts of encouraging or inducing non-citizens to reside in the United States for financial gain was “overbroad and unconstitutional,” covering “a substantial amount of speech protected by the First Amendment.”

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Maine Gov. Janet Mills’ Administration Sued for Discrimination Against Catholic Schools

Susan Berry, PhD

St. Dominic Academy in Auburn, Maine filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the administration of Gov. Janet Mills (D) and the Maine Human Rights Commission that alleges the state has continued to “outmaneuver” the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Carson v. Makin by excluding religious schools from its longstanding program whereby students residing in districts without a public school are given the opportunity to attend the public or private school of their family’s choosing.

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FIRE: Street Preacher’s Arrest at Pennsylvania Pride Event and Subsequent Dismissal Is a Free-Speech Lesson

Bradley Vasoli

Charges were dropped this week regarding Christian street preacher Damon Atkins who was arrested for speaking negatively about an LGBTQ pride-flag-raising he attended at Reading, Pennsylvania City Hall on Saturday. 

“After review of the video of the incident, including body-worn cameras, and a review of the case law, we did not believe we could prove a criminal case of disorderly conduct,” Berks County’s District Attorney’s office said in a statement.

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Court Rejects Massachusetts Middle-Schooler’s Free Speech Request to Wear ‘Two Genders’ Shirt at School

Susan Berry, PhD

The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in Boston denied 12-year-old Liam Morrison’s request this week for a temporary injunction or restraining order to block his school from prohibiting expression of his view that “there are only two genders” before the court issues its final decision. “MFI [Massachusetts Family Institute] recently filed suit to vindicate the rights of this brave Middleborough 7th-grader to wear a shirt to school that simply stated ‘There Are Only Two Genders,’” the pro-family organization said in a press statement sent to The Star News Network. “After being censored by his school, Liam’s case went viral. MFI has partnered with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) to file a federal lawsuit against the school.”

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No Word Yet from Pennsylvania State University on FIRE’s Freedom Concerns

Bradley Vasoli

The Pennsylvania State University has reportedly yet to answer a Philadelphia-based free-speech nonprofit’s request that the school confirms adherence to freedom of association.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) asked Penn State to do so after a brief disagreement this spring between administrators and the College Independents. This student group hosts political discussions featuring “a wide variety of viewpoints.” 

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Commentary: Rally Round the … Flag?

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On June 1, 2023, Lower Gwynedd Township, Pennsylvania will raise the Pride Flag. In what sounds like a solemn ceremony, students will speak about the Pride Flag’s personal significance to them. Politicians, civic leaders and religious leaders will also show their support for the LGBTQ+ community.

So Lower Gwynedd Township, one of the oldest townships in Montgomery County wants to celebrate a certain lifestyle. They will permit the LGBTQ community to display a flag that represents the pride a group of people has for their sexual orientation: homosexual, bisexual, transexual and others. So what is sexual orientation? According to the website of Planned Parenthood, sexual orientation is defined as: “who you’re attracted to and want to have relationships with.”

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Analysis: Companies That Ignore First Amendment Rights

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A new database shows that some of Americans’ favorite companies—such as Airbnb, Amazon, and Disney—disregard religious freedom and free speech. 

Alliance Defending Freedom, a legal organization devoted to protecting religious freedom and other First Amendment rights, joined with Inspire Insight, an investment tool that provides data on the religious values of companies, to produce the second annual Business Index ranking companies by Viewpoint Diversity Score. 

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Massachusetts Middle School Doubles Down on Censoring 12-Year-Old’s ‘Two Genders’ Shirt

Susan Berry, PhD

Massachusetts middle school student Liam Morrison was reportedly told again to remove his shirt Friday, one that said, “There Are Censored Genders,” which he wore to protest his school’s alleged decision to censor his right to free speech.

Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) said it is now preparing to take legal action on behalf of Liam and his parents “to vindicate Liam’s right to speak truth in a culture inundated by lies.”

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Massachusetts Family Institute Defends First Amendment Rights of 12-Year-Old Student Against School That Punished Him for Wearing ‘Two Genders’ Shirt

Susan Berry, PhD

The Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) announced Tuesday the public policy organization sent a demand letter to the superintendent of Middleborough Public Schools on behalf of a 12-year-old student who was allegedly punished for wearing a shirt that said, “There are only two genders.”

Liam Morrison defended his First Amendment rights to his school committee on April 13, several weeks after he was reportedly taken out of gym class at Nichols Middle School and informed by school staff that complaints had been made about the shirt he was wearing that said, “There are only two genders.”

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Connecticut State Trooper Wins $260,500 Settlement in Lawsuit Against Police Union and Department Officials

Susan Berry, PhD

A Connecticut State Trooper won a settlement in his federal civil rights lawsuit against officials of the Connecticut State Police Union (CSPU) and Department of Emergency Services (DESPP), in which he charged them with illegally demoting him for his refusal to become a union member and to pay union dues to support CSPU’s political positions.

The trooper, Joseph Mercer, who was represented by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, settled the lawsuit for $260,500.

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Counseling Ban Promotes Gender Identity as Religion, Censors Science, Diverse Critics Tell SCOTUS

Just the News

First Amendment speech protections may be circumscribed for therapists and medical professionals in the American West, critics warn, unless the Supreme Court scrutinizes a Washington law prohibiting any “regime that seeks to change” a minor’s sexual orientation or gender identity.

Christian doctors, pro-life pregnancy centers, pediatricians, gender-critical feminists and a dozen states led by Idaho filed friend-of-the-court briefs last week urging the justices to review the so-called conversion law, warning it prevents providers from sharing research on the harms of hormonal and surgical procedures for gender-confused minors.

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Massachusetts Boy Confronts School Board After Allegedly Being Punished for ‘There Are Only Two Genders’ Shirt: ‘Why Do the Rules Apply to One Yet Not Another?’

Susan Berry, PhD

A 12-year-old Middleborough, Massachusetts school boy recently defended his First Amendment rights to his school committee after allegedly being sent home from school for making others feel unsafe by wearing a shirt that says, “There are only two genders.”

A video of Liam Morrison’s confrontation of his school committee was reported Sunday at the Libs of TikTok Twitter account.

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Catholic Advocacy Group Sues FBI and DOJ for FOIA Documents Related to Government Targeting of Catholics

Susan Berry, PhD

National Catholic advocacy organization CatholicVote filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit with Judicial Watch Thursday against the FBI and DOJ for failing to provide records requested under FOIA regarding the government’s targeting of Catholics.

CatholicVote President Brian Burch spoke to Fox & Friends Thursday about the lawsuit.

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Free Speech Advocates Win Case for Political Expression in Pennsylvania Park

Bradley Vasoli

A federal court on Wednesday ruled that local authorities wrongly forbade political activists from gathering candidate-petition signatures at Fort Hunter Park in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Last June, the Keystone Party of Pennsylvania’s candidate for state House District 104 Dave Kocur worked alongside party board member Kevin Gaughen in asking park visitors to sign petitions to get Kocur on the ballot. Park security guards directed them to stop. After the activists refused, citing their constitutional right to free expression in a public forum, Dauphin County Parks Director Anthea Stebbins ordered them to desist, explaining that the county disallows any political activity at Fort Hunter. 

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After Heated Debate, House Lawmakers Pass Legislation Shielding Teachers from Civil Liability over ‘Preferred Pronoun’ Use

TC Weber

A law protecting Tennessee teachers from civil liability if they fail to use a student’s preferred pronouns, is heading to the governor’s desk for his signature. The law extends protection to all employees of a public school, as well.

The proposed law comes at a time when discussions around transgender issues have moved to the forefront. Supporters say the bill does nothing but protect the First Amendment rights of teachers. While critics argue that the bill is part of a trio of anti-LGBTQ+ bills passed by the Tennessee legislature this session. The first, regulated public drag shows across the state, while the other banned some gender-related medical procedures for minors. Those same critics often neglect to acknowledge that those procedures and drugs, physiologically alter the young person’s body, often irreversibly.

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Maricopa County Loses First Amendment Lawsuit from The Gateway Pundit, Agrees to Pay $175,000 for Banning Reporter from Elections

Rachel Alexander

Maricopa County agreed last week to pay The Gateway Pundit (TGP) and its reporter Jordan Conradson $175,000 to settle their lawsuit over refusing to provide Conradson with a press pass to cover elections. An Obama-appointed trial court judge sided with the county in November, but after an injunction from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals followed by oral arguments that revealed the three-judge panel was likely to fully reverse the lower court, the Maricopa County Supervisors voted to settle. 

The controversy began in September 2022, when the county implemented a press pass regulation blocking journalists from election press conferences if they showed “conflicts of interest” and were not “free of associations that would compromise journalistic integrity or damage credibility.” The county cited Conradson’s attendance at Republican events as a conflict of interest, and told him, “[Y]ou are not a bona fide correspondent of repute in your profession.” 

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Pennsylvania Lawmaker Proposes Forcing Social Media to Police ‘Unwelcome’ Speech

Bradley Vasoli

A Pennsylvania legislator is asking her colleagues cosponsor a measure to police “unwelcome” speech on social-media platforms. 

In a memorandum describing her emerging bill, state Representative Darisha Parker (D-Philadelphia) wrote that her policy “would require social media network companies to establish and maintain effective and transparent complaint procedures for reporting hate speech content.” She further stated the legislation would “mak[e] it clear that hate speech is unwelcome on social media in Pennsylvania.”

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New Revelations of FBI Efforts to Infiltrate Catholic Church Provoke Storm of Protest

Just the News

Revelations this week of FBI efforts to develop intelligence sources inside the Catholic Church elicited howls of protest — from Capitol Hill, the Church and an FBI whistleblower.

Amid the latest revelations of political bias and retaliation by the FBI, Arizona Republican Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ-05) is calling for the increasingly polarizing law enforcement agency to be purged of politicized personnel and possibly defunded.

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Catholic Advocacy Group Prepared to Sue FBI for Failure to Comply With FOIA on Targeting of ‘Radical Traditional Catholics’

Susan Berry, PhD

A leading national Catholic advocacy organization says it is prepared to file a lawsuit against the FBI for failing to comply with its Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that seeks communications information related to a leaked document that revealed the bureau was targeting so-called “radical traditional Catholics.”

“On March 6th we filed a freedom of information act request with the FBI in Richmond, VA, asking for communications regarding the targeting of traditional Catholics,” stated CatholicVote in a tweet Tuesday. “Norms require the agency to respond within 20 business days, with an additional 10 for ‘unusual circumstances.’ To date we have not received any response.”

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Lawsuit: Oregon State Officials Deny Woman’s Adoption Application Because of Her Christian Religious Beliefs

Susan Berry, PhD

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) filed a federal lawsuit last week against the Oregon Department of Human Services (ODHS) on behalf of a woman whose application to adopt siblings from foster care was denied because her Christian faith beliefs do not allow her to agree to support the “sexual orientation, gender identity, [and] gender expression” of children placed in her home.

“Oregon’s policy amounts to an ideological litmus test: people who hold secular or ‘progressive’ views on sexual orientation and gender identity are eligible to participate in child welfare programs, while people of faith with religiously informed views are disqualified because they don’t agree with the state’s orthodoxy,” said ADF Senior Counsel Jonathan Scruggs, who runs the ADF Center for Conscience Initiatives.

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FIRE Presents ‘Free Cheesesteaks for Free Speech’ to Philadelphians

Bradley Vasoli

On Wednesday, hundreds stopped by Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) tables on 9th Street in South Philadelphia this weekend for two things Philadelphia has generated lots of over the years: cheesesteaks and liberty. 

FIRE, a Philadelphia-based institution since its founding in 1999, held the “Free Cheesesteaks for Free Speech” event as part of a larger $3.1-million pro-free-expression campaign featuring broadcast ads, billboards and digital promotions. The group, which initially focused on fighting speech restrictions on college campuses and recently broadened its mission to include other forums, hopes the effort will raise awareness of ongoing battles to honor the text and the spirit of the First Amendment. 

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Arizona Considers Bill to Fine Social Media Firms $250,00 Per Day for Banning Candidates

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Social media platforms that choose to suspend or ban candidates for office would face tens of thousands – or hundreds of thousands – of dollars a day in fines under legislation working its way through the Legislature.

The House Commerce Committee on Tuesday approved Senate Bill 1106 along party lines. The bill defines how a social media suspends, bans or reduces the exposure of an account. This is also referred to as “shadowbanning.”

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Politically Diverse Groups Back Free Speech at Pitt After Pennsylvania Lawmakers Urge Event Cancellation

Bradley Vasoli

After two Pennsylvania lawmakers last week called for cancelling upcoming conservative appearances at the University of Pittsburgh, a politically diverse array of voices are responding in favor of free speech. 

Representatives Jessica Benham (D-Carrick) and Malcolm Kenyatta (D-Philadelphia), who co-chair the state House LGBTQ+ Equality Caucus, denounced the state-related university for permitting the presence of speakers who oppose liberal views of transgenderism. The guests they find objectionable include Cabot Phillips, senior editor of the The Daily Wire news organization, who is scheduled to speak this Friday; Riley Gaines, a former college swimmer and critic of biological males competing in women’s sports, who will appear on March 27; and Michael Knowles, a Daily Wire commentator, who will debate transgender economist Deirdre McCloskey on April 18. All speakers are being sponsored by student-led associations. 

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Catholic Civil Rights Group Condemns State Legislation to Force Priests to Break Seal of Confession

Susan Berry, PhD

Bills in the states of Vermont, Delaware, and Washington would include in mandatory reporting laws information about child sexual abuse a priest learns during the Sacrament of Reconciliation, a move the Catholic League states lacks sound reasoning.

Last week Catholic League President Bill Donohue warned the “seal of confession” is “under fire” in Vermont, noting the Catholic civil rights organization is once again “doing battle with lawmakers who want to violate” the priest-penitent privilege, mostly in legislation concerning the sexual abuse of minors.

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THREATTOSCOTUS2022: FBI Whistleblowers Say Threat Tags Were Used to Target Conservatives

Just the News

What do school parents, Catholic attendees of Latin Mass and pro-life activists have in common? They’ve all been branded by the FBI as potential domestic terrorist threats in what whistleblowers say is a growing trend of using intelligence threat tags to enforce cancel culture.

The latest revelation came this past weekend when House Republicans released testimony from an FBI whistleblower who alleged colleagues in the bureau flipped a terrorist threat tag originally created to flag threats against pro-life Supreme Court justices into a signifier that anti-abortion protesters were somehow a threat.

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Ohio Republican State Senator Reynolds Introduces Bill to Preserve Student’s Religious Expression

Hannah Poling

Even though public schools in Ohio cannot close for all religious holidays, a Republican state senator says that students don’t deserve penalization for observing them and that schools should treat them as legitimate absences.

Senate Bill (SB) 49 known as the “Religious Expression Days” Act sponsored by State Senator Michele Reynolds (R-Canal Winchester) aims to require local boards of education to draft “non-exhaustive” lists of religious holidays and excuse students for up to three days each academic year.

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California Christian Teacher Allegedly Fired for Refusal to Comply with District Gender Policies: ‘The District Cannot Accommodate Your Religious Beliefs’

Susan Berry, PhD

A California Christian physical education teacher was allegedly fired for refusing to lie to parents about their children’s gender identities at school and reject having males in female locker rooms – both policies that violate her faith beliefs, Fox News Digital reported Wednesday.

Jessica Tapias apparently shared with Fox News Digital the notice she received from the office of Jurupa Unified School District Superintendent Trenton Hansen.

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Robert Kiyosaki Responds to Arizona State University Faculty Members Condemning Event Featuring Him, Dennis Prager, and Charlie Kirk

Rachel Alexander

Arizona State University’s Barrett Honors College is sponsoring a “Health, Wealth & Happiness” panel discussion on February 8 featuring Rich Dad Poor Dad bestselling author Robert Kiyosaki, conservative leaders Dennis Prager and Charlie Kirk, and wellness expert Dr. Radha Gopalan. Most of the faculty at Barrett — 37 of 47 members as of February 2 — denounced Kiyosaki, Prager, and Kirk in a February 1 letter addressed to the dean. Kiyosaki spoke to The Arizona Sun Times about the criticism.

“If they picket me, this won’t be the first time I’ve been received like this,” he said. Kiyosaki served in the Marines as a gunship pilot during the Vietnam War, and when he returned home, protesters targeted him and his fellow Marines and spit on them. Kiyosaki has written over 26 books related to finance, and Rich Dad Poor Dad is the best-selling personal financial book of all time. 

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University of Wisconsin System Survey Shows Free Speech Under Assault on College Campuses

M.D. Kittle

Nearly half of the University of Wisconsin System students who responded believe administrators should ban the expression of views that some students feel cause harm to certain groups of people, according to an extensive survey on campus freedom of speech released Wednesday. 

Some 68 percent of those surveyed say students should report an instructor who says something in class deemed harmful to certain groups. 

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Former ASU Student Appeals Trespassing Conviction for Handing Out Copies of US Constitution

Neil Jones

Former Arizona State University student Tim Tizon, being represented by the Chicago-based Liberty Justice Center, filed an appeal in the State of Arizona v. Tizon case Thursday after being convicted for trespassing while handing out copies of the Constitution on the ASU campus. Reilly Stephens, a staff attorney at the LJC, told The Arizona Sun Times this appeal is all about protecting First Amendment Rights.

“For us [the LJC], the core idea here is pretty straightforward. If the First Amendment’s going to mean anything, it means that at the public spaces of a public university, a student should not be arrested for handing out copies of the constitution,” said Stephens via the phone. “What could be a more basic free speech principle than that?”

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Arizona State University Student Convicted of Criminal Trespassing for Handing Out Copies of the Constitution on Campus Files Appeal

Rachel Alexander

Arizona State University (ASU) student Tim Tizon was convicted in October of criminal trespassing in the third degree for handing out copies of the U.S. Constitution on the school’s campus. University Lakes Justice of the Peace Tyler Kissell, a progressive, conducted the trial. The Liberty Justice Center is now representing Tizon with an appeal, which was filed on Thursday.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Group Sues Mainstream Media Outlets over Alleged Antitrust, First Amendment Violations

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Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. announced Tuesday night that he and several other plaintiffs had filed a groundbreaking lawsuit against several major news organizations, accusing them of antitrust and constitutional violations.

During a live interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Kennedy, chairman and chief litigation counsel for Children’s Health Defense (CHD), said the lawsuit targets the Trusted News Initiative (TNI), a self-described “industry partnership” launched by several of the world’s largest news outlets—including the BBC, The Associated Press (AP), Reuters, The Washington Post, Google Microsoft, Facebook, and Twitter—in March of 2020.  The lawsuit argues that the TNI was launched, in part, because the corporate media organizations believed that smaller independent news outlets were threatening their business models.

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Leftists Sue Ohio Secretary of State Over New Voter ID Law

Bradley Vasoli

Attorneys for the Elias Law Group announced over the weekend they are representing several left-leaning institutions seeking to nix Ohio’s new law requiring voters to show photo identification to participate in an election. 

The Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless, the Ohio Federation of Teachers, the Ohio Alliance for Retired Americans and the Union Veterans Council are listed as plaintiffs in the lawsuit against Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose (R). The firm working the case is headed by Marc Elias who has handled cases for Democrats in the 2020 presidential contest and numerous other national elections. 

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Commentary: From What, Exactly, Is the FBI Protecting Us?

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After the tiered releases of the Twitter files, many suspicions have been thoroughly confirmed. Namely, social media monopolies like Facebook and Twitter worked hand-in-glove with the FBI, as well as other government agencies, to suppress accounts and censor stories they jointly deemed misinformation, disinformation, or otherwise harmful to the country during the 2020 election.

The most significant malfeasance arises from the coordinated campaign to suppress the New York Post story about Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop. The laptop exposed in great detail Hunter’s dissolute lifestyle, along with his role as the family “bag man” for various overseas financial interests.

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State Senators Propose Pennsylvania Law Against Social Media Censorship

Bradley Vasoli

Pennsylvania State Senators Doug Mastriano (R-Gettysburg) and Scott Hutchinson (R-Oil City) Thursday announced they would reintroduce a bill proposed in the last legislative session designed to prevent social media platforms from censoring Pennsylvanians. 

Mastriano and Hutchinson introduced the original measure in May 2021. They secured the cosponsorship of four other senators, all Republicans, but the bill did not receive a vote in the Senate Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure Committee. The two lawmakers said new developments impelled them to try again in the new session. They cited the recently released “Twitter files,” internal documents pertaining largely to the social-media company’s decision in late 2020 to deny users access to a New York Post story concerning Joe Biden’s son Hunter’s personal computer.

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More Evidence Reveals CDC Colluded with Social Media Giants to Silence COVID ‘Misinformation’

Susan Berry, PhD

America First Legal (AFL) released a fourth set of documents obtained from litigation against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that reveals more evidence of alleged collusion between the nation’s public health agency and social media companies to censor free speech and silence Americans under the government’s label of “misinformation.”

Last week, AFL’s 600-page document release uncovered evidence that Twitter operated a “Partner Support Portal” for government employees and other selective “stakeholders” that would allow them to delete or flag posts viewed as “misinformation,” noted AFL, which is led by former President Donald Trump’s immigration advisor Stephen Miller.

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Virginia Restaurant Cancels Christian Group’s Reservation Due to Its Pro-Life and Traditional Marriage Views

Susan Berry, PhD

A Virginia restaurant owner denied service to a Christian organization about 90 minutes prior to its private party because the group is pro-life and embraces one man-one woman marriage.

Victoria Cobb, president of the Family Foundation of Virginia, which holds pro-life and traditional marriage values, told The Daily Signal that, following her group’s participation in activities outside the Supreme Court Monday morning, while the justices heard oral arguments in a case to decide if a public accommodation law compelling a creative person’s speech or silence violates the First Amendment, she was informed the Metzger Bar and Butchery was “unwilling to serve” the organization.

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Republican Ohio Lawmakers Challenge FEC Expenditure Law, Allege It’s Unconstitutional

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Two Republican lawmakers from Ohio filed a lawsuit against the Federal Election Commission (FEC), alleging it violates candidates First amendment rights by limiting their ability to coordinate with political parties, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The lawsuit, filed on Nov. 4 by Senator-elect JD Vance and Representative Steve Chabot, as well as the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) and the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) in an Ohio district court, claims that FEC guidelines which “limits… coordinated party expenditures” violates the First Amendment “by strictly limiting how much of [a party committee’s] own money they can spend to influence federal elections in cooperation- or ‘coordination’- with their candidates.”

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University in Ohio Retracts Plan That Could Have Punished Students and Staff for Using People’s Legal Names

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The University of Toledo walked back a potential policy which would have required faculty and students use an individual’s “chosen name” after the First-Amendment watchdog group Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) accused it of violating free speech rights.

The proposed policy, introduced in February, attempted to mandate the use of a name an individual “choose[s] to be called in day-to-day life” in all verbal communication and on all documents where a legal name is not required such as on course rosters, university identification and directories. FIRE, however, accused the policy of being in violation of the First Amendment for policing speech.

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Sen. Mike Lee’s Amendment to Safeguard Religious Liberty for Americans Who Hold to Traditional Marriage Fails By One Vote

Susan Berry, PhD

Senator Mike Lee’s (R-UT) religious liberty amendment to the Democrats’ same-sex marriage bill failed by just one vote, 48-49, an outcome that, if the legislation is signed into law, could give a green light to the federal government’s retaliation against nonprofit faith organizations, such as schools and businesses, whose religious beliefs are incompatible with gay marriage.

Senate Democrats voted Tuesday, 61-36, to codify same-sex marriage into federal law with the help of 12 Republicans, as the Senate Press Gallery noted.

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Senator Sounds Alarm for Same-Sex Marriage Bill as It Clears Another Hurdle with GOP Support, ‘Without Sufficient Protections for Religious Liberty’

Susan Berry, PhD

A bill that would enshrine same-sex marriage in federal law progressed further in the Senate Monday evening with significant Republican support, but without sufficient religious liberty protections, and is now headed to a vote on Tuesday.

The Senate voted, 61-35, with four senators not voting, to end debate on the House-passed bill, dubbed the Respect for Marriage Act (RFMA), that would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act which defined marriage in federal law as between one man and one woman.

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Far-Left Pennsylvania Democrat Proposes Board to ‘Combat Election Disinformation’

Bradley Vasoli

Pennsylvania state Representative Christopher Rabb (D-Philadelphia) this week proposed a bill to establish an “Election Integrity Board” that would monitor politicians rhetoric regarding electoral matters and “combat” what the panel deems “disinformation.” 

In a memorandum seeking cosponsors for his legislation, the far-left lawmaker who represents Philadelphia’s Chestnut Hill and Mount Airy neighborhoods lamented the nomination in the 2022 primary of over 100 individuals he considers “election-denying candidates.” He blasted them for asserting what he insists are “unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud” and opined that “our elections are highly secure.” He suggested that politicians and hopefuls who raise concerns about such issues create unnecessary doubt in the minds of the electorate.

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Doctors Sue Newsom, California Medical Board for Law Regulating COVID-19 Advice

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A group of California physicians filed a lawsuit against Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state’s medical board over a new law that will regulate what doctors can tell patients about COVID-19 risks and treatments.

A.B. 2098 will make it “unprofessional conduct” for physicians or surgeons to provide their patients “false information” related to COVID-19, including vaccines, “that is contradicted by “contemporary scientific consensus contrary to the standard of care.” The legislation discriminates against alternative viewpoints and creates “a severe chilling effect,” contradicting the First Amendment, the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA)-backed lawsuit contends.

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Suspended Vermont Student and Coach Father Sue School District for Retaliating After Complaint About Biological Male in Girls’ Locker Room

Susan Berry, PhD

A Vermont high school volleyball player who was suspended from school and her father, the team’s coach, who was suspended from his job, are suing the school district for retaliating against them following their complaint about the policy that allows biological males in the girls’ team locker room.

Blake Allen, 14, a student at Randolph Union Middle School, and her father, Travis Allen, who coaches his daughter’s volleyball team, spoke out against a biological male, claiming to be female, being allowed in the girls’ team locker room while they were changing. Now, the family is suing the school district after Blake was suspended and Travis was fired from his job, asserting the district retaliated against them, the Daily Signal reported Thursday.

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