Free Speech Under Attack: Congress Ignores Bills To Protect Press And Critics

Earlier, Karl wrote about a bill from Senator Ron Wyden which would put pressure on big telcos to actually protect our privacy (following the news of Chinese hackers abusing backdoor access to our wiretapping systems to spy on tons of people). Sadly, despite the obvious need in the wake of this massive privacy breach, that bill appears doomed, with the next FCC likely to move in the opposite direction and reduce oversight of telecom security practices.

But there are also two other Wyden bills that are incredibly important to free speech, and both look like they will also be ignored. The first is the journalist shield law, the PRESS Act, which would establish a federal shield law for journalists, and the second is the Free Speech Protection Act, a federal anti-SLAPP bill. Unfortunately, despite bipartisan support in the House, Congress appears unlikely to pass either in the face of opposition from former President Trump and his allies.

At a time when press freedoms and the right to criticize the powerful are under threat, Congress is poised to shamefully abandon two crucial bills that would offer vital protection.

The PRESS Act would protect journalists and their sources, which is so important as we enter an era when whistleblowers are going to be so critical. As we mentioned last month, this bill had widespread bipartisan support. It passed the House unanimously (which is crazy). But Donald Trump ordered Republicans to kill the bill, more or less admitting that he wants to intimidate both whistleblowers and reporters from revealing what he's up to.

Last week, Senator Wyden went to the floor of the Senate to try to get the Senate to vote on the bill as well, calling out its unanimous support in the House. But Senator Tom Cotton, an ever-loyal Trump extremist, blocked the bill from going forward by spewing some nonsense about the deep state."

Passage of this bill would turn the United States Senate into the active accomplice of deep-state leakers, traitors, and criminals, along with the America-hating and fame-hungry journalists who help them out," Senator Cotton said. Contrary to what members of the press may think, a press badge doesn't make you better than the rest of America."

This is utter nonsense. The PRESS Act is not about aiding traitors or criminals - it's about ensuring that journalists can protect their sources and carry out their constitutionally critical role of holding the government accountable. Whistleblowers who expose government wrongdoing are not deep-state leakers," they are concerned individuals exercising their First Amendment rights. And journalists who report on these revelations are not America-hating," they are fulfilling their duty to keep the public informed and holding the government to account.

Now why would Senator Cotton not want that, I wonder? It sure seems that Cotton's scaremongering is a transparent attempt to shield those in power from legitimate scrutiny and oversight.

The other bill is a federal anti-SLAPP bill. This one was led by Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin in the House, along with Republican Rep. Kevin Kiley. But Wyden introduced the companion legislation in the Senate (I heard that an effort was made towards getting a Republican Senator to sign on, and none did, which is truly unfortunate).

We've been writing about anti-SLAPP laws for so long now, including multiple attempts to get a federal anti-SLAPP law, all of which have gone nowhere. Once again, this bill is also going to go nowhere, and that's going to literally destroy lives.

We've seen a growing trend of the rich and powerful (including many people who are now about to run the federal government) filing totally bogus SLAPP suits to punish critics and intimidate others from ever criticizing them. A federal anti-SLAPP law would be a huge boost for free speech, allowing those who are sued for no legitimate reason to get rid of those lawsuits faster and (in some cases) to have the plaintiff have to pay their legal fees.

The actual bill, The Free Speech Protection Act, is not perfect, but it's very good and would protect many people from chilling, vexatious, censorial litigation.

So of course Congress is ignoring it.

It's deeply hypocritical for those like Trump who complain about lawfare" to then turn around and block these obviously commonsense bipartisan bills to prevent exactly that. The chickenshit political class is missing a chance to actually protect free speech. They're cowering in the face of a vengeful incoming administration that has made it clear that it intends to engage in widespread lawfare and to threaten critics repeatedly. Congress could stand up against that and actually protect free speech.

But it won't.

Senator Wyden and Representatives Raskin and Kiley should be commended for their efforts to protect press freedom and the right to criticize the powerful. It's a damning indictment of the rest of Congress that, given the opportunity to defend core First Amendment values, they are instead allowing these crucial bills to wither.