free press – Techdirt (original) (raw)
Ridiculous: Journalist Held In Contempt For Not Revealing Sources
from the underpinnings-of-a-free-press dept
Going way, way back, we’ve talked about the need for protection of journalistic sources, in particular the need for a federal journalism shield law. I can find stories going back about 15 years of us talking about it here on Techdirt. The issue might not come up that often, but that doesn’t make it any less important.
On Thursday, a judge held former CBS journalist Catherine Herridge in contempt for refusing to reveal her sources regarding stories she wrote about scientist Yanping Chen.
The ruling, from U.S. District Court Judge Christopher R. Cooper, will be stayed for 30 days or until Herridge can appeal the ruling.
Cooper ruled that Herridge violated his Aug. 1 order demanding that Herridge reveal how she learned about a federal probe into Chen, who operated a graduate program in Virginia. Herridge, who was recently laid off from CBS News, wrote the stories in question when she worked for Fox News in 2017.
In his ruling, Judge Cooper claims that he’s at least somewhat reluctant about this result, but he still goes forward with it arguing (I believe incorrectly) that he needs to balance the rights of Chen with Herridge’s First Amendment rights.
The Court does not reach this result lightly. It recognizes the paramount importance of a free press in our society and the critical role that confidential sources play in the work of investigative journalists like Herridge. Yet the Court also has its own role to play in upholding the law and safeguarding judicial authority. Applying binding precedent in this Circuit, the Court resolved that Chen’s need for the requested information to vindicate her rights under the Privacy Act overcame Herridge’s qualified First Amendment reporter’s privilege in this case. Herridge and many of her colleagues in the journalism community may disagree with that decision and prefer that a different balance be struck, but she is not permitted to flout a federal court’s order with impunity. Civil contempt is the proper and time-tested remedy to ensure that the Court’s order, and the law underpinning it, are not rendered meaningless.
But the First Amendment is not a balancing test. And if subpoenas or other attempts to reveal sources can be used in this manner, the harm to journalism will be vast. Journalism only works properly when journalists can legitimately promise confidentiality to sources. And that’s even more true for whistleblowers.
Admittedly, this case is a bit of a mess. It appears that the FBI falsely believed that Chen was a Chinese spy and investigated her, but let it go when they couldn’t support that claim. However, someone (likely in the FBI) leaked the info to Herridge, who reported on it. Chen sued the FBI, who won’t reveal who leaked the info. She’s now using lawful discovery to find out who leaked the info as part of the lawsuit. You can understand that Chen has been wronged in this situation, and it’s likely someone in the FBI who did so. And, in theory, there should be a remedy for that.
But, the problem is that this goes beyond just that situation and gets to the heart of what journalism is and why journalists need to be able to protect sources.
If a ruling like this stands, it means that no journalist can promise confidentiality, when a rush to court can force the journalist to cough up the details. And the end result is that fewer whistleblowers will be willing to speak to media, allowing more cover-ups and more corruption. The impact of a ruling like this is immensely problematic.
There’s a reason that, for years, we’ve argued for a federal shield law to make it clear that journalists should never be forced to give up sources. In the past, attempts to pass such laws have often broken down over debates concerning who they should apply to and how to identify “legitimate” journalists vs. those pretending to be journalists to avoid coughing up info.
But there is a simple solution to that: don’t have it protect “journalists,” have the law protect such information if it is obtained in the course of engaging in journalism. That is, if someone wants to make use of the shield law, they need to show that the contact and information obtained from the source was part of a legitimate effort to report a story to the public in some form, and they can present the steps they were taking to do so.
At the very least, the court recognizes that the contempt fees should be immediately stayed so that Herridge can appeal the decision:
The Court will stay that contempt sanction, however, to afford Herridge an opportunity to appeal this decision. Courts in this district and beyond have routinely stayed contempt sanctions to provide journalists ample room to litigate their assertions of privilege fully in the court of appeals before being coerced into compliance….
Hopefully, the appeals court recognizes how problematic this is. But, still, Congress can and should act to get a real shield law in place.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, catherine herridge, free press, journalism, journalist shield law, sources, yanping chen
Oklahoma Senator Thinks Journalists Need Licenses, Should Be Trained By PragerU
from the garbage-people-doing-garbage-things dept
“They’re not sending their best.”
I hear ya, Donnie. Just look at the jamokes you’ve inspired to set fire to the Constitution, if only because they failed to set fire to Capitol Hill following the 2020 election.
Florida’s full of them. The state legislature is infested with people who think fascism is something to aspire to. As far as they see it, the Constitution protects the rights of white males. Everyone else should just get used to their faces being stamped on forever.
Florida may be the worst, but state governments all over the nation are filled with people too stupid to govern but savvy enough to get elected. The residents that support them love them for their stupidity and performative lawmaking. Everyone else is reduced to looking on in disbelief, at best. At worst, they’re now the target of laws meant to further elevate white, straight males at the expense of everyone else.
But let’s not short-sell these legislators. They’re willing to cross the line to punish white, straight males if these outliers are unwilling to bend the knee. Critics of these government figures are also being pushed up against the wall by legislators, a disturbing number of which are willing to rewrite the First Amendment in their own image. If “free” speech doesn’t make the people in power happy, then that speech should no longer be “free.”
That brings us to the latest bit of anti-Constitutional thuggery being pushed forward in a state legislature. This time is yet another state with a panhandle hosting the idiocy, as Walter Einenkel reports for Daily Kos.
On Wednesday, Oklahoma state Sen. Nathan Dahm has proposed a bill that would require journalists to submit to drug tests, take courses in being “propaganda-free,” and get a license from the state.
Senator Dahm is not only an idiot when its comes to crafting law, but he’s also incapable of coming up with his own ideas.
This isn’t the first, second, or third time that conservative lawmakers have attempted to control the free press by demanding some sort of licensing requirements. In 2016, a South Carolina Republican introduced a bill that would require journalists to be registered and vetted by the state. An Indiana Republican tried to do a similar thing in 2017, arguing it was the same as licensing Second Amendment rights. And in 2023, a Florida lawmaker attempted to force bloggers who write about Gov. Ron DeSantis, people in his administration, or state legislators to register with the government.
About the only thing new in Dahm’s attack on the First Amendment is the entity he wants to aid and abet in this mass violation of rights. The bill [PDF] mandates cultural readjustment at the hands of Dahm’s preferred brainwasher.
Each individual reporter, producer, writer, editor, or any other employee involved in the production of content distributed by a media outlet is hereby required to:
a. complete a criminal background check conducted by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, b. receive a license as prescribed by the Corporation Commission as provided in subsection C of this section, c. complete a propaganda-free safety training course of no less than eight (8) hours as prescribed by the State Department of Education, which shall be developed in coordination with PragerU, d. provide proof of liability insurance no less than One Million Dollars ($1,000,000.00), and e. submit to quarterly drug testing for illicit substances to be administered by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation;
Holy shit. We’re on the other side of reality now. “Propaganda-free safety training courses” developed by a performative “school” whose inability to comprehend the First Amendment and/or Section 230 immunity has seen it lose lawsuit after lawsuit. The Senator doesn’t want the state’s journalism to be “free” of “propaganda.” He wants it to parrot the propaganda he likes and is willing to use the government’s power to ensure this happens.
If you don’t think that set of mandates is ridiculous enough, there’s more. These are the ravings of someone who read 1984 and came to the conclusion the government didn’t punish Winston Smith enough.
The list above is just for individual journalists, whether or not they work for larger news agencies. The list of requirements for journalist entities demands $50 million in liability insurance, mandatory PragerU “propaganda” training for all employees (whether they’re journalists or not), and this fever dream of a disclaimer to be attached to anything published by journalists:
“WARNING: THIS ENTITY IS KNOWN TO PROVIDE PROPAGANDA. CONSUMING PROPAGANDA MAY BE DETRIMENTAL TO YOUR HEALTH AND HEALTH OF THE REPUBLIC.”
Welcome to Trump’s America, as legislated by long-time bootlickers like Senator Nathan Dahm. And if you really enjoy deep, dark levels of irony, you should definitely check out Dahm being absolutely crucified on a cross constructed entirely of his own hypocrisy by Jon Stewart. In this interview, Dahm argues against gun registration:
JON STEWART: You want to say I’m a Second Amendment purist and I’m making it safer? You’re not. You’re making it more chaotic. And that’s not a matter of opinion. That’s the truth.
STATE SEN. NATHAN DAHM: That is a matter of opinion, Jon.
STEWART: But why take away their tools?
DAHM: Because certain of their tools that they’re using would be infringements upon the people’s right to keep and bear arms upon their constitutional rights upon due process, upon other things.
STEWART: So you’re saying that registering is an infringement?
And there it is. Dahm thinks people exercising their Second Amendment rights shouldn’t have to be subjected to government interference like registration. But with this bill, he feels people exercising their First Amendment rights should be subjected to registration requirements.
This bill won’t make it far. I mean, I would hope. Even his allies in the state senate are unlikely to support a law that not only pretends the First Amendment doesn’t exist, but allows PragerU to come along for the ride. Unfortunately, Dahm is representative (no pun intended) of legislators being elected all over the country. These people are a threat to democracy and the nation itself. And yet it appears a sizable percentage of voters are ok with a descent into fascism, just as long as it hurts other people first.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, free press, free speech, journalism, licensing journalists, nathan dahm, oklahoma, propaganda
Companies: prageru
County Attorney Rejects Warrant Used In Raid Of Small Kansas Newspaper, Asks Court To Force Cops To Return Seized Devices
from the fucking-around,-finding-out dept
Last week, cops in a small Kansas town decided they’d just toss aside the First Amendment and raid a local newspaper.
There were competing narratives. The first was that the paper was in possession of information related to the drunk driving arrest of local business owner Kari Newell, who had allegedly been convicted of DUI and driving without a license.
The thing is the paper never made this information public. Instead, it verified the information handed to it by a source and then contacted the Marion, Kansas police department.
The second narrative appeared during an interview with the surviving co-owner of the paper, Eric Meyer. This one suggested the raid of the paper’s offices and the home of 98-year-old co-owner, Joan Meyer, were prompted by the paper’s ongoing investigation of Marion police chief Gideon Cody’s misconduct history, which allegedly involved sexual misconduct.
I used the word “surviving” for a reason. Joan Meyer died shortly after suffering through the raid of her paper’s office and the raid of her home. During these raids, nearly every electronic device possessed by Meyer and the paper was seized, including the paper’s servers and Joan Meyer’s personal computer and internet router.
According to what little information was available (including a very noncommittal statement by the Marion PD), the supposed crime was identity theft aided and abetted by unauthorized computer access.
But whatever the real reason for this disturbing abuse of government power, it appears to be headed towards a swift denouement. At least some of this accelerated pace can be attributed to the piqued interest of outside government entities, which arrives on the heels of nationwide coverage.
Outrage from Eric Meyer, the owner and publisher of the Marion Record, appears to have reached the KBI [Kansas Bureau Investigation].
On Wednesday, the law enforcement agency announced in conjunction with the Marion County Attorney that the investigation would continue without the examination of any evidence seized during the raid.
That accompanies a letter sent by the paper’s attorney, Bernard Rhodes — a letter that points out the raids violated the First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, and state laws that protect journalists and their sources.
All of this has added up to Marion County Attorney Joel Ensey announcing that he has formally withdrawn the warrant and has asked for law enforcement to return everything officers seized.
On Monday, August 14, 2023, I reviewed in detail the warrant application made on Friday, August 11, 2023 to search various locations in Marion County including the office of the Marion County Record. The affidavits, which I am asking the court to release, established probable cause to believe that an employee of the newspaper may have committed the crime of K.S.A. 21-5839, Unlawful Acts Concerning Computers. Upon review, however, I have come to the conclusion that insufficient evidence exists to establish a legally sufficient nexus between this alleged crime and the places searched and items seized. As a result, I have submitted a proposed order asking the court to release the evidence seized. I have asked local law enforcement to return the material seized to the owners of the property.
The matter remains under review until such time as the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, the agency now in charge of the investigation, may submit any findings to the office for a charging decision. At such time, a determination will be made as to whether sufficient evidence exists under the applicable rules and standards to support a charge for an offense.
Some good things there. The call for the release of the documents. The call for the release of the seized electronics (albeit on that doesn’t appear to demand law enforcement destroy any copies of data investigators may have made). And the correct call on the incident in question: it appears unlawful, even if the county attorney (for reasons related to his continued employment) isn’t willing (yet) to go on record as calling “unlawful.”
There are some bad things, too. It seems unlikely the KBI will uncover evidence of criminal activity by newspaper staff. But it does allow another law enforcement agency to root around in seized data and try to find some connection between the charge leading to these rights violations, in hopes of turning them into something resembling probable cause.
The county attorney has asked law enforcement to release everything seized. But it’s only a request. That the Marion PD has yet to publicly state it will release the seized devices suggests it’s not nearly as willing to admit it’s in the wrong. Nor is it as willing to make things rights. And that’s going to end up costing county residents their tax dollars, which will be added to the tab already rung up by local cops — one that now includes shattered trust and an extremely damaged relationship with the town it serves.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, eric meyer, free press, gideon cody, intimidation, joan meyer, joel ensey, journalism, kansas, kbi, marion county, police raid, raid, warrant
Companies: marion county record
Kansas Cops Raid Small Town Newspaper In Extremely Questionable ‘Criminal Investigation’
from the sorry-about-the-boot-prints-on-your-rights dept
The free press is supposed to be free. That’s what the First Amendment means. Journalists have a long-acknowledged, supported-by-decades-of-precedent right to publish information that may make the government uncomfortable.
When cops start raiding press outlets, everyone takes notice. This isn’t how this works — not in the United States with its long list of guaranteed rights.
But that’s what happened at a small newspaper in Kansas, for reasons local law enforcement is currently unwilling to explain.
In an unprecedented raid Friday, local law enforcement seized computers, cellphones and reporting materials from the Marion County Record office, the newspaper’s reporters, and the publisher’s home.
Eric Meyer, owner and publisher of the newspaper, said police were motivated by a confidential source who leaked sensitive documents to the newspaper, and the message was clear: “Mind your own business or we’re going to step on you.”
The city’s entire five-officer police force and two sheriff’s deputies took “everything we have,” Meyer said, and it wasn’t clear how the newspaper staff would take the weekly publication to press Tuesday night.
While there’s still some speculation about the reason for this raid, this law enforcement action has at least accelerated the demise of the paper’s owner.
Stressed beyond her limits and overwhelmed by hours of shock and grief after illegal police raids on her home and the Marion County Record newspaper office Friday, 98-year-old newspaper co-owner Joan Meyer, otherwise in good health for her age, collapsed Saturday afternoon and died at her home.
She had not been able to eat after police showed up at the door of her home Friday with a search warrant in hand. Neither was she able to sleep Friday night.
She tearfully watched during the raid as police not only carted away her computer and a router used by an Alexa smart speaker but also dug through her son Eric’s personal bank and investments statements to photograph them. Electronic cords were left in a jumbled pile on her floor.
Sure, correlation is not causation, but one can reasonably expect that a law enforcement raid on an elderly person’s home — especially one who had just found out her paper had been raided by the same officers — would not result in an extended life expectancy.
Even if you ignore the death as being nothing more than the result of being 98 years old, you have to recognize the insane overreach that saw a newspaper’s offices raided, followed by a raid of the newspaper owner’s home.
In addition to these raids, officers also raided the home of vice mayor Ruth Herbel.
All anyone knows is what’s stated in the warrant application, as well as a recent bit of friction involving the paper, some leaked DUI records, and a local business owner.
According to Meyer, a retired University of Illinois journalism professor, the raid came after a confidential source leaked sensitive documents to the newspaper about local restaurateur Kari Newell. The source, Meyer said, provided evidence that Newell has been convicted of DUI and was driving without a license—a fact that could spell trouble for her liquor license and catering business.
Meyer, however, said he ultimately did not decide to publish the story about Newell after questioning the motivations of the source. Instead, he said, he just alerted police of the information.
“We thought we were being set up,” Meyer said about the confidential information.
That’s according to the paper’s co-owner, Eric Meyer. These raids were set in motion by information the newspaper didn’t even publish and despite the fact the Marion County Record informed law enforcement about the leaked info.
That’s one theory: that Kari Newell had enough pull to put the police in motion to silence a potential publisher of leaked info that, to this point, had not made the leaked information public.
There’s also another theory, which suggests something even more horrible than a local business owner weaponizing local law enforcement to keep their own misdeeds under wraps.
An interview with Eric Meyer by Marisa Kabas suggests this might have nothing to do with a local restaurateur’s alleged drunk driving. What may actually be happening here is local law enforcement attempting to silence reporting about… well, local law enforcement.
What has remained unreported until now is that, prior to the raids, the newspaper had been actively investigating Gideon Cody, Chief of Police for the city of Marion. They’d received multiple tips alleging he’d retired from his previous job to avoid demotion and punishment over alleged sexual misconduct charges.
And that’s a new wrinkle that makes everything worse. Raiding a newspaper, a newspaper owner’s home, and the home of the vice mayor over unpublished news about a local businessperson’s DUI problems is one thing. Performing these raids to prevent a small paper from publishing what it had discovered about the chief of police is quite another. The first is a horrible infringement of First Amendment rights. The latter is a hideous abuse of law enforcement powers.
According to the warrant, the cops are investigating a couple of crimes. One seems extremely unrelated to either theory: “Identify Theft.” That crime is described as expected: the use of another person’s identity to commit fraud. Nothing in either theory suggests anything like that was committed by the paper, its owners, or the vice mayor. There has been some talk that if you squint and cheat, you could conceivably argue that a possible method of checking Newell’s driver’s license could possibly, technically, violate the state’s identity theft law, but that is an extreme stretch, and still would not justify the full raid and seizures.
The other law cited in the warrant — K.S.A. 21-5839 — is the real problem here. The state law is pretty much the CFAA: a catch-all for “computer” crimes that allows law enforcement (if so motivated) to treat almost anything that might resemble a journalistic effort to gather facts as a crime against computers.
There’s a whole lot of vague language about “authorization,” which means opportunistic cops can use this law to justify raids simply because they did not “authorize” any release of information pertaining to either (a) DUI arrests or citations, or (b) the chief of police’s past history as an alleged sex fiend.
What’s on the record (such as it is) suggests these raids are the acts of officers seeking to protect one of their own: police chief Gideon Cody. The end result of the raids was the seizing of the means of (press) production. Reporters’ computers and phones were seized, along with the small paper’s server — seizures that appear to be designed to silence this press outlet. While ongoing silence would obviously protect the police department, as well as a business owner who may not want the wrong kind of press attention, Occam’s Razor suggests cops will always be far more interested in protecting themselves than taxpayers, no matter how (comparatively) rich they might be.
The Marion, Kansas Police Department has responded to the national outrage generated by its actions. And its official statement uses a whole lot of words to say absolutely nothing.
The Marion Kansas Police Department has has several inquiries regarding an ongoing investigation.
As much as I would like to give everyone details on a criminal investigation I cannot. I believe when the rest of the story is available to the public, the judicial system that is being questioned will be vindicated.
I appreciate all the assistance from all the State and Local investigators along with the entire judicial process thus far.
Speaking in generalities, the federal Privacy Protection Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000aa-2000aa-12, does protect journalists from most searches of newsrooms by federal and state law enforcement officials. It is true that in most cases, it requires police to use subpoenas, rather than search warrants, to search the premises of journalists unless they themselves are suspects in the offense that is the subject of the search.
The Act requires criminal investigators to get a subpoena instead of a search warrant when seeking “work product materials” and “documentary materials” from the press, except in circumstances, including: (1) when there is reason to believe the journalist is taking part in the underlying wrongdoing.
The Marion Kansas Police Department believes it is the fundamental duty of the police is to ensure the safety, security, and well-being of all members of the public. This commitment must remain steadfast and unbiased, unaffected by political or media influences, in order to uphold the principles of justice, equal protection, and the rule of law for everyone in the community. The victim asks that we do all the law allows to ensure justice is served. The Marion Kansas Police Department will nothing less.
First off, the judicial system isn’t what’s being “questioned.” It’s the acts of this particular cop shop, which will always be far less impartial than the judges overseeing their cases. While we would like to know why these search warrants we’re granted, we’re far more interested in why law enforcement sought them in the first place.
The rest of this non-explanation is just CYA boilerplate. We all know how cops are supposed to behave. A cop frontmouth telling us that what we’re witnessing is nothing more than cops behaving they way we expect them to — while refusing to provide any specifics — means nothing at all until the facts come out. The problem is the Marion Police Department thinks the lack of facts means it should be given the benefit of a doubt, rather than recognize this is a situation it will need to fully justify if it expects to salvage what’s left of its eroding reputation.
Either way, what local law enforcement should have immediately recognized, long before the raids were carried out, is that this would draw national attention to these unconstitutional raids as well as give the Marion County Recorder a bunch of fans capable of offsetting the damage done by these blundering officers.
This is from Meyer, the paper’s surviving co-owner:
It is kind of heartwarming: One of the things that I just noticed was we got this incredible swelling of people buying subscriptions to the paper off of our website. We got a lot of them, including some—I’m not gonna say who they’re from—but one of them is an extremely famous movie producer and screenwriter who came in and subscribed to the paper all of a sudden. I mean, it’s like, why are people from Poughkeepsie, New York and Los Angeles, California and Seattle, Washington and, you know, all these different places subscribing to the paper?
But a lot of people seem to want to help, and we’ve had people calling, asking “where can I send money to help you?” And, well, we don’t need money right now. We just are gonna have a long weekend of work to do. But we’ll catch up.
No matter the reason for the raids, the cops fucked up. But it will take a lawsuit to hold them accountable for their actions. No one outside of the participating departments believes these actions were justified. No one believes these raids weren’t carried out for the sole purpose of protecting people in power, whether it was a local business owner or the local police chief. Everything about this is wrong. Hopefully, a court will set this straight, as well as require the PD to explain the motivation for its actions in detail, putting to rest the speculation these oversteps have generated.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, 4th amendment, cfaa, computer crimes, eric meyer, free press, free speech, gideon cody, hacking, identity theft, joan meyer, journalism, kansas, kari newell, marion pd, police raid, ruth herbel
Companies: marion county record
Baltimore Prosecutor Asks FCC To Go After Local News Broadcasters She Doesn't Like
from the looking-real-progressive-there,-Marilyn dept
It’s not often you see a politician ask the FCC to step in to punish a news station. And for good reason: the First Amendment. Politicians are welcome to fight speech they don’t like with more speech, but they shouldn’t be calling for a federal government investigation of a TV station just because they don’t like the slant of the stories about them.
Baltimore (MD) City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby thinks a local Fox affiliate is unfairly portraying her and her official doings. Rather than just accept that this is part of being in the business of politics, Mosby is asking the FCC to ask Fox to stop being Fox. Here’s the angry letter [PDF] her office wrote — one she boosted into Streisandia by airing her particular grievance on Twitter. (h/t Adam Steinbaugh)
This is a formal complaint requesting an investigation into the broadcasting practices and media content distributed by FCC-licensed station WBFF, a Baltimore City-based Fox News-affiliated network, specifically the content distributed to the public about the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office (SAO), a government entity, and its lead prosecutor, State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby that upon viewing could reasonably be categorized as blatantly slanted, dishonest, misleading, racist, and extremely dangerous.
Well, that’s Fox for you. And if the FCC hasn’t done anything yet to go after broadcasters who “intentionally distort the news” — something forbidden by FCC rules — there’s a good chance it won’t be doing anything about this complaint either. And a lot of “intentional distortion” is often in the eye of the beholder. Mosby is definitely aggrieved, but being mad about stuff isn’t the same as being right about stuff, especially when the Constitution is on the line.
In my capacity at the States Attorney’s Office, I have noted that the news coverage of the WBFF persistently follows a disconcerting and dangerous pattern: beginning with a slanted, rigged, misleading, or inflammatory headline; followed by a conspiracy theory; and supported with guest commentary from disgruntled ex-employees or political opponents that lend false credibility to their biased coverage or omission of facts.
Whew. Sounds just like any news outlet that has hosts and commentators with axes to grind. Nothing unusual here other than a government figure demanding the federal government start targeting protected speech. And speaking of conspiracy theories, Mosby has one of her own:
Most disturbingly, there appears to be an intentional crusade against State’s Attorney Mosby, which given today’s politically charged and divisive environment, is extremely dangerous.
Mosby also has problems with how often she’s being covered by the local Fox affiliate, which is another thing you don’t see too many politicians complaining about: too much press.
In 2020, there were 248 stories by the WBFF solely about SA Mosby. In comparison, other local news networks ran significantly fewer stories. When assessed over the same period in 2020, Baltimore City stations did the following: WBAL – 26 stories; WJZ – 46; and WMAR – 10. So far in 2021, the WBFF has run 141 slanted stories.
Looks like a really good use of Baltimore tax dollars: having staffers watch TV to find things for Mosby to complain to the FCC about.
Mosby claims this heated, frequent coverage of her endangers her personally. According to Mosby, the slanted broadcasting — combined with the station’s one-time broadcast of her home address — has resulted in her receiving multiple death threats and fearing for her safety. How much of this would have happened without WBFF’s allegedly unfair coverage is unknown.
The letter then lists a sampling of the “slanted” coverage that Mosby finds so disturbing her office is asking for FCC intervention. And it’s a pretty bland list.
Rollout of new policies by Marilyn Mosby needed more collaboration, experts say
Baltimore City State’s Attorney Avoids Oversight
Role Top Prosecutor Plays in Baltimore Violence
Quotes from these offending pieces are also attached and they’re equally inoffensive:
It’s been about three weeks since City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby doubled down on her plan to permanently stop prosecuting what she calls “low-level” offenses.
Findings from an Operation: Crime & Justice investigation show City and State watchdog agencies don’t audit City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s Office.
Since the riots in 2015, Baltimore City has seen hundreds of lives lost. Sean Kennedy who is a visiting fellow at the Maryland Public Policy Institute tells Fox45 News, “The State’s Attorney is a crucial player in curbing crime in any jurisdiction.”
Somehow this equates to an assault on the State’s Attorney sensibilities and an attack on the right of the people to be able to access “unbiased” news. Somehow this innocuous batch of pretty mild criticism is something that “incites racists to act upon their animus for the State’s Attorney.”
Mosby wraps the complaint with a paragraph that is inconsistent with everything surrounding it:
To be clear, the State’s Attorney’s Office is not above receiving criticism. We welcome being held accountable, and we support First Amendment freedom of speech. However, what we find troubling, abhorrent, and outright dangerous, is that the distinctly relentless slanted broadcast news campaign, against the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office and its lead prosecutor, has the stench of racism.
The Attorney’s Office will only accept criticism that’s “unslanted.” It will only be held accountable by journalists it considers to be fair. And it fully supports the First Amendment rights of everyone but the broadcasters at WBFF. And, I hate to say it, commentary and opinion with a “stench of racism” is still protected speech.
If Mosby really respects the First Amendment and welcomes criticism, she should simply post this letter — minus all the stuff requesting action from the FCC — and let residents draw their own conclusions about WBFF and its coverage of local politics. A government official asking a government agency to open an investigation into a journalistic entity has the stench of censorship.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, baltimore, fcc, free press, free speech, marily mosby, retaliation
Companies: wbff
Attacks On Internet Free Speech In Malaysia And Indonesia Demonstrate Why Section 230 Is So Important
from the intermediary-liability-is-all-about-free-speech dept
Two separate stories from Southeast Asia help demonstrate why intermediary liability protections like Section 230 are so important for free speech online (and why it’s positively ridiculous that some have argued that 230 is an attack on free speech). The first is an article about a court case in Malaysia, in which a small independent media site has been fined an astounding amount: $124,000 over five reader comments that a court said violated the law. Notably, the website in question, Malaysiakini, had removed those comments relatively quickly. But the court said that the removals weren’t fast enough:
A seven-judge appeals court panel found Malaysiakini guilty of contempt of court and ordered it to pay a fine of nearly $124,000, more than double the amount sought by prosecutors, for five comments left by readers.
There was a conflict of interest here: the five comments were insults about the judiciary who then went on to issue the fine itself. The court argued that Malaysiakini should have pre-vetted every comment before allowing them on the site:
The readers? comments were posted on a story about the Malaysian judiciary, which closely guards its reputation. They were later removed from the article, but not quickly enough to avoid charges.
In their verdict, the judges concluded that Malaysiakini should have vetted the comments and refrained from posting those that constituted contempt of court.
The site argued — quite reasonably — that it shouldn’t be held liable for user comments, but the court rejected that argument.
The panel rejected defense arguments that Mr. Gan and the news outlet were not legally responsible for their readers? comments and that prosecutors should have been required to prove that they intended to publish scandalous material.
The article goes on to note what a massive chilling effect this will have for speech in Malaysia, where most media organizations are propaganda operations for the government. Malaysiakini is one of a group of small independent sites that have been known to challenge the government (another such site, Sarawak Report, was blocked in Malaysia and resulted in all of the website Medium being blocked in Malaysia for a few years after the site started publishing on Medium.
Of course, this shouldn’t be a surprise. Right after the mess with Sarawak and Medium, the Malaysian government put in place a new law that focused on removing intermediary liability protections for service providers, so the government could hold them liable for speech it disliked. And now we see how that’s working out.
That’s also why people should be very, very concerned about what’s happening nearby in Indonesia, where a truly draconian new intermediary liability regulations has been proposed. Rather than protecting intermediaries that enable speech, this law — called MR5 — seems designed to lead to widespread censorship. The law will require websites to register with the government, and must give law enforcement full access to any user content — including private communications and private storage. Companies based outside of Indonesia are still required to appoint a local contact or they could be blocked entirely.
As for intermediary liability, a key part of the law is that a website must takedown “prohibited information” even when posted by a user — but that includes any information that “creates community anxiety” or lets people know how to access such content:
This language is extremely concerning. Compelling Private ESOs to ensure that they are not ?informing ways” or ?providing access? to prohibited documents and information, in our interpretation, would mean that if a user of a Private ESO platform or site decides to publish a tutorial on how to circumvent prohibited information or content (for example, by explaining how to use VPN to bypass access blocking), such a tutorial itself could be considered prohibited information. Use of a VPN itself could be considered prohibited information. (The Communications Minister has told Internet users in Indonesia to stop using Virtual Private Networks, which he claims allow users to hide from authorities and put users? data at risk.)
The speech restrictions go pretty far as well:
Article 9(3) includes within ?prohibited content and information? any speech that violates Indonesian law and regulations. GR71, a regulation one level higher than MR5, and the later Law No. 11 of 2008 on Electronic Information and Transactions, both use similar vague language without offering any further definition or elucidation. For example, Law No. 11 of 2008 defines ?Prohibited Acts? as any person knowingly and without authority distributing and/or transmitting and/or causing to be accessible any material thought to violate decency; promote gambling; insult or defame; extort; spread false news resulting in consumer losses in electronic transactions; cause hatred based on ethnicity, religion, race, or group; or contain threats of violence. We see a similar systematic problem with the definition of ?community anxiety? and ?public order,? which fails to comply with the requirements of Article 19 (3) of the ICCPR.
Additionally, Indonesia?s criminal code considers blasphemy a crime?even though outlawing “blasphemy” is incompatible with international human rights law. The United Nations Human Rights Committee has clarified that laws that prohibit displays of lack of respect for a religion or other belief systems, including blasphemy laws, are incompatible with the ICCPR. When it comes to defamation law, the UNHRC states that any law be crafted with care to ensure it does not stifle freedom of expression. The laws should allow for the defense of truth and should not be applied to other expressions that are not subject to verification. Likewise, the UNHRC has stated that ?laws that penalize the expression of opinions about historical facts are incompatible with the obligations that the ICCPR imposes on States parties to respect for the right to freedom of opinion and expression.? Criminal defamation law has been widely criticized by UN Special Rapporteurs on Free Expression for hindering free expression. Yet under this new law, any speech that violates Indonesian law is deemed prohibited.
In addition, the law appears to deputize website operators to spy on their users and block any such content.
MR5 also obliges Private ESOs (except cloud providers) to ensure that their service, websites or platforms do not contain and do not facilitate the dissemination of such prohibited information or documents. Private ESOs are then required to ensure that their system does not carry prohibited content or information, which will in practice require a general monitoring obligation, and the adoption of content filters. Article 9 (6) imposes disproportionate sanctions, including a general blocking of systems for those who fail to ensure there is no prohibited content and information in their systems.
It will not be surprising to learn of stories like the first one above concerning a Malaysian publication to happen in Indonesia under this law as well.
This is one reason why Section 230 is so important to free speech. But letting the websites themselves determine what content they’re comfortable with hosting, rather than threatening to fine them out of existence if any “bad” content gets through, it means that there are places for a wide variety of content online. What Malaysia has already done, and what Indonesia is doing now, is a way to truly censor critics of the government, and to make sure that they have no corner of the internet to speak out against government corruption.
Filed Under: comments, free press, free speech, indonesia, intermediary liability, malaysia, section 230
Indian Government Threatens To Jail Twitter Employees For Restoring Accounts The Government Wants Blocked
from the watch-out-what-you-ask-for dept
We keep pointing out to people the very slippery slope that happens when we say it’s okay for the government to tell websites how they have to moderate. And what’s happening in India is a very important case study. As you’re hopefully aware, there have been ongoing farmer protests in India, as farmers are quite upset about regulatory changes that they fear will destroy their businesses. The protests have been going on for weeks, but things have recently escalated to include some violence.
Prime Minister Narendra Mohdi is responding to all of this in a similar fashion to what he’s done before: by cracking down on free speech and going after his critics. It started with full internet blackouts in places where the protesters were, with the government claiming it was necessary to cut off the internet to “maintain public safety” (yeah, right). Then, the government demanded that Twitter block the accounts of various journalists, publications, and celebrities who have been critical of Mohdi. Twitter complied, but after widespread criticism, it turned those accounts back on, apparently telling the Indian government that the tweets were protected free speech and newsworthy.
One of the accounts that had been taken down was the Caravan, a small but influential investigative journalism outfit that is widely read among politicians. A writer for Caravan, Vidya Krishnan, has a chilling account in The Atlantic about how this crackdown represents “the end of the Indian Idea.” It’s well worth reading. It notes that beyond just having the Twitter account shut down, the Mohdi government has arrested a Caravan writer and begun an investigation of its editors.
These latest attacks, part of a pattern of legal cases, personal threats, and intimidation against news outlets and individual journalists, make certain what was becoming evident: The freedom of the press, a constitutional right, is endangered in Modi?s India. The brazen use of social-media networks to censor journalists, the use of the police and courts to silence them, and, more fundamentally, the belief that those who report on protests are somehow undermining the state illustrate how much has changed in India, and how far the country has strayed from its founding ideals.
On Tuesday, the situation became an even more dangerous attack on free speech. It appears that Mohdi’s administration is not at all happy with Twitter’s decision to push back and re-enable the accounts it demanded blocked. It is now threatening Twitter employees with jailtime and fines for the decision.
On Tuesday, the IT ministry sent a notice to Twitter, ordering it to block the accounts once again. It also threatened people who work at Twitter’s Indian arm with legal consequences, which could include a fine or a jail term of up to seven years.
?This is really problematic,? said Nikhil Pahwa, editor of MediaNama, a technology policy website, and an internet activist. ?I don?t see why the government of India should wade into this territory of trying to censor tweets when they have much bigger problems to deal with.?
When we point out situations like this, in which the government would abuse such power, we often have people say that we’re being ridiculous and such power wouldn’t be abused in the US (if it was somehow even deemed allowed under the 1st Amendment). But as that Atlantic article points out, India has freedom of expression in its Constitution as well.
And even if you believe in American exceptionalism (which you probably shouldn’t) and that it would be okay if the law were changed in the US, but not elsewhere, just note that countries like India (and many others) would use such a law in the US as an excuse for why their own crackdowns on free expression are in accordance with US norms.
And, of course, this puts Twitter in a somewhat impossible spot. If it does what everyone knows is the right thing morally and ethically, and refuses to suspend these accounts, it faces a difficult future in the country. Its own employees may be thrown in jail and fined. India has already been not just blocking the internet, but many Chinese apps such as TikTok. I would not put it past the Mohdi government to declare a block on Twitter. Of course, if the company caves in and takes the content back down, then it raises significant moral questions about how it may be supporting the crackdown on free speech, a free press, and on protesters in India.
It is easy to argue that Twitter should continue to take this stand and do the morally right thing, but it’s much easier to do it as a nobody typing words on a computer screen than as someone actually making the very real call which could have widespread consequences for many, many people.
Filed Under: farm protests, free press, free speech, india, narendra mohdi
Companies: twitter
Australian Court Says Raid Of Journalist's Home Was Illegal… But Allows Federal Police To Keep The Evidence They Seized
from the wrong-but-not-wrong-enough-I-guess dept
Last year, the Australian government decided journalists just weren’t feeling chilly enough. In response to the publication of leaked documents detailing the government’s plan to allow more domestic surveillance, the Australian Federal Police started raiding journalists’ homes.
They started with News Corp. journalist Annika Smethurst’s home. Hours later, police raided broadcaster Ben Fordham’s home. A third raid was broadcast live, as the AFP swarmed ABC’s offices seeking documents that might reveal who leaked sensitive documents to journalists.
Australia’s prime minister, Scott Morrison, had no problem with this cop-based threat to the country’s free speech protections.
Asked if the news troubled him, he said: “It never troubles me that our laws are being upheld.”
The laws aren’t being upheld. That’s the determination of the country’s highest court. In fact, they’re being broken.
News Corp. journalist Annika Smethurst went to the High Court to overturn the warrant that was executed on her Canberra home in June last year and triggered a national campaign for greater press freedom.
The seven judges unanimously agreed that the warrant was invalid, partly because it failed to state the offense suspected with sufficient precision.
Unfortunately, the court didn’t go so far as to uphold protections for journalists that should shield them from law enforcement raids seeking to uncover their sources.
But the majority of judges rejected her application for the material seized to be destroyed, meaning police could still use it as evidence against her.
This ruling only raises further questions. If the warrant is invalid, what is this evidence being used for? The charges are unclear, according to this court, but somehow the evidence of… whatever… is still valid and can be used to engage in an investigation, if not a prosecution?
For the moment, the AFP says it won’t be looking at the evidence it took from Smethurst’s home.
Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw said the evidence taken from Smethurst had been “quarantined” from the investigation for the moment.
“So what we’ll do carefully and correctly is take legal advice … on what we do with that particular material,” Kershaw told reporters. “Investigators are not able to look at that.”
That may be, but that statement doesn’t say anything about any “looking at” that may have been occurred before court proceedings made it potentially unwise to keep sifting through possibly-tainted evidence.
With this still unsettled, this statement — from the head of News Corp. — seems a bit overconfident.
“The High Court ruling sends an indisputable message, that the Federal Police must obey the law and that their raid on Annika Smethurst’s home was illegal,” Miller said in a statement. “Annika Smethurst should not be prosecuted for simply doing her job as a journalist to rightly inform Australians on serious matters of public interest.”
Michael Miller is right: Smethurst should not have been targeted — much less raided — for publishing leaked documents. The government’s supposed allegiance to protecting free speech rights should have prevented a journalist from being the subject of a law enforcement investigation. But he’s somewhat wrong about the message the court sent. It did say the warrant was invalid. But it refused to force the AFP to destroy the illegally obtained evidence. That’s not an “indisputable message.” That’s a mess that still needs to be properly sorted out. All it really says is the AFP needs to be a bit more careful crafting warrants before disregarding the protections Australian journalists are supposed to have.
Filed Under: annika smethurst, australia, free press, free speech, journalism, leaks, raiding journalists, warrant
Companies: news corp
The Similarities Between The US's Case Against Julian Assange And Brazil's Against Glenn Greenwald Are Uncanny
from the attacks-on-a-free-press dept
When Julian Assange was arrested in the UK and taken out of the Ecuadorian embassy, many of us raised concerns that the charges against him appeared to be things that every investigative reporter does in finding sources. The superseding indictment of Assange made it clear that the DOJ’s case against Assange was a direct attack on a free press. Indeed, even some federal prosecutors worried about the charges going way too far.
Yet, we got tremendous pushback on this, as people kept insisting that it was different, that Julian Assange had gone further than normal reporters, and that because there have been claims that he was associated with the Russians, that this somehow made the charges against him okay. Yet, with the recent news of Brazil charging Glenn Greenwald with crimes for reporting on leaked documents, we noted that the case seemed to parallel the US’s case against Assange. Mathew Ingram, over at the Columbia Journalism Review, has now written a more in-depth piece on how the two cases mirror each other:
This strategy?trying to paint a journalist as an active participant in a crime, as opposed to just the recipient of leaked material?is clearly a heinous attack on freedom of the press protections, something journalists and anyone in favor of free speech should be up in arms about. But it doesn?t exist in a vacuum. The case against Greenwald happens to be almost a carbon copy of the Justice Department?s argument in the affidavit it filed against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange last year, which contains more than a dozen charges under the Espionage Act. Just like the Brazilian government, US prosecutors try to make the case that Assange didn?t just receive leaked diplomatic cables and other information from former Army staffer Chelsea Manning, but that he actively participated in the hack and leaks, and therefore doesn?t deserve the protection of the First Amendment.
Regardless of what we think of Julian Assange or WikiLeaks, this is an obvious attack on journalism, just as Brazil?s legal broadside against Glenn Greenwald is an obvious attack by Bolsonaro on someone who has become a journalistic thorn in his side. A man who helped win a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on leaked documents involving mass surveillance by US intelligence, files that were leaked to him by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. And the charges come even after Brazil?s Supreme Court ruled last year that Greenwald could not be prosecuted for the hacking case because of press freedom laws. In a statement, Greenwald called the Brazil charges ?an obvious attempt to attack a free press in retaliation for the revelations we reported about Minister Moro and the Bolsonaro government,? and said he and the Intercept plan to continue publishing. And so they should.
What’s even more concerning about this: even if you think that Assange is a terrible human being and actively conspired with the Russians, even if you think he belongs in jail, recognize that the US DOJ has given a great playbook to every authoritarian country out there on how to arrest and jail journalists reporting on leaks, and to claim that they’re just doing the same thing as the supposed bastion of a free press, the United States.
Filed Under: brazil, doj, free press, free speech, glenn greenwald, journalism, julian assange, leaks
Turkey Continues Its Attempt To Pass China In The 'Most Journalists Jailed' Category
from the WEEEEEEEEEE-ARE-THE-CHAMPIONNNNNNNNS-MY-FRIEND dept
Turkey continues to be awful. The President of the country, Recep “Gollum” Erdogan, continues to fight his own personal brand of “War on Terror.” So far, this “war” is mostly on critics and journalists, since actual terrorism isn’t something Erdogan seems to care about as much as his own reputation.
Critics located all over the world have felt the proxy wrath of the frequently-besmirched PM. Some countries have been especially obliging, turning over their own citizens to face criminal charges for insulting the Turkish head of state.
Journalists all over the world are feeling the heel of Erdogan’s boot, the size of which is inversely proportional to the thickness of his skin. Rather than limit his censorial efforts to the war at home, Erdogan frequently calls on US tech companies to engage in censorship on his behalf. Twitter is a favorite.
You’re nothing if you’re not on the leader boards. Erdogan sees himself as a living superlative. So it’s no surprise his government is seeking to overtake the Red Granddaddy of Censorship — China — in the category of “Most Journalist Jailed.” Presumably, the Guinness people will just mail him his award, rather than risk being swept up in his “War on Terror” for listing Nobel Prize winners or whatever.
More journalists have been convicted of crimes against Herr Erdogan. Unfortunately for the authoritarian, not too many of them will actually be jailed, which isn’t going to help him overtake China in the jailed journalist race. Prosecution in absentia is the new normal for Turkey since local journalists have realized staying in the country means forced retirement from their chosen profession.
Alert Interpol, I guess, as though that international partnership is really interested in converting itself into an extension of Turkey’s government. The “War on Terror” continues, with Turkish courts fighting the war at home by sentencing journalists self-exiling abroad.
A Turkish court on Friday convicted six journalists and one other employee of an independent newspaper of aiding the network of a U.S.-based cleric who is accused of masterminding the failed coup in 2016, the state-run news agency reported.
Conjecture and hearsay are kinds of evidence, the Turkish lawyers certainly argued. Some of those sentenced will actually be headed to jail post-appeal, since there’s no reason to believe this kangaroo courtship will be annulled upon further review.
Others will just spend their sentences not living in Turkey, as the supposed coup “mastermind” is doing.
[T]he primary target of Erdogan’s wrath is Fethullah Gulen, an Islamic scholar in his late 70s living in exile in the United States. Erdogan blames Gulen for masterminding the failed coup attempt. The government has declared Gulen’s movement a terrorist organization.
Jailing someone in their late-70s seems unusually cruel. (We do it here so stop throwing stones.) But it’s just not going to happen as long as Gulen lives in the United States. Anyone with any connection to Gulen is being branded a terrorist, even if most of them are just journalists who had nothing to do with the failed coup that has led directly to the jailing of over 100 journalists.
Criticizing Erdogan from abroad really doesn’t do much to diminish his power at home. But it does keep him busy. It keeps his courts tied up trying cases of suspects the government can never jail and it keeps the busybodies in the censorship department active filing social media complaints. Now, if only we (the US and its tech companies) weren’t so eager to help…
Filed Under: free press, free speech, intimidation, jailing, journalists, recep tayyip erdogan, turkey