Supreme Court
Washington Times: Supreme Court declines to hear closely watched bar association dues case
By James Varney
The Supreme Court declined Monday to hear a North Dakota case involving a lawyer’s required bar membership, but those trying to have the practice overturned may soon get another crack at it.
Arnold Fleck filed a lawsuit in 2015, contending that North Dakota’s requirement that lawyers be members of the state bar association to practice there infringed on his First Amendment rights because bar dues funded political work with which Mr. Fleck may disagree. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Mr. Fleck in August.
Some 30 states have similar requirements.
The case has divided conservatives, with some arguing the high court should hear it to send a message of employment liberty, while others urging the justices to wait for a broader case out of Wisconsin now in the 7th Circuit.
In Jarchow v. State Bar of Wisconsin, now wending its way through the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, some legal analysts believe the justices would have a clean slate to extend the reasoning behind its Janus decision, which said that public-sector employees cannot be forced to pay union dues.
The Hill: Former public worker asks Supreme Court to force repayment of union dues
By Harper Neidig
An anti-union advocate who won a landmark Supreme Court case two years ago is now asking the court to order a public sector labor group to pay back the union dues that it had ruled unconstitutional.
Lawyers for Mark Janus, a former child support specialist in Illinois, filed a petition on Monday asking the high court to follow up on its ruling that public sector employees cannot be forced to pay union dues. Janus is appealing an appeals court ruling that held that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) does not have to pay him back for fees that it collected before the Supreme Court ruling.
Online Speech Platforms
TechCrunch: Google’s Vint Cerf voices support for common criteria for political ad targeting
By Natasha Lomas
Google VP Vint Cerf has voiced support for a single set of standards for internet platforms to apply around political advertising.
Speaking to the U.K. parliament’s Democracy and Digital Technologies Committee today, the longtime Googler – who has been chief internet evangelist at the tech giant since 2005 – was asked about the targeting criteria it allows for political ads and whether he thinks there should be a common definition all platforms should apply.
“Your idea that there might be common criteria for political advertising I think has a certain merit to it,” he told the committee. “Because then we would see consistency of treatment – and that’s important because there are so many different platforms available for purposes of – not just advertising but political speech.”
“In the U.S. we’ve already experienced the serious side effects of some of the abuse of these platforms and the ability to target specific audiences for purposes of inciting disagreement,” he added. “We should make it difficult for our platforms to be abused in that way.”
Washington Examiner: William Barr wading into dangerous territory with possible support for anti-tech regulation
By Jessica Melugin
Last month, Attorney General William Barr said, “valid questions have been raised on whether Section 230’s broad immunity is still necessary, at least in its current form.” But the attorney general and other critics should think twice before advocating for altering the crucial law…
[T]oday, misguided criticisms of Section 230 come from both sides of the aisle.
Critics on the Left feel that online platforms aren’t doing enough moderation of content. This week, Democratic Rep. David Cicilline announced plans to introduce a bill that would remove Section 230 protections from platforms that refuse to police political speech…
From the Right, the criticism is the opposite. Conservative tech skeptics insist that the same online platforms are doing too much moderation, and are disproportionately silencing conservative voices in the process.
RealClearPolitics: Hillary Clinton: “The Right-Wing Echo Chamber Has Mastered Facebook, Aided And Abetted By Facebook”
By Tim Hains
Sunday in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, Hillary Clinton discussed how the “right-wing echo chamber has mastered Facebook, aided and abetted by Facebook.”
In response to a report that the number one most clicked news article on Facebook on Super Tuesday was about her email scandal, Clinton said: “They know how not only to drive those stories under the radar screen where the mainstream press like yourself are covering, you know, what’s happening now, but they know how to deliver those stories through the algorithms into the feeds of millions and millions of people.”
“So I begrudgingly give them a lot of credit because they are shaping a narrative that is part of the messaging around Trump’s re-election,” she said.
Candidates and Campaigns
Fox News: Trump camp fires back after Twitter labels Biden video ‘manipulated’
By Gregg Re
The Trump campaign has sent a scathing letter to Twitter’s leadership after the platform took the unprecedented step of labeling one of its videos “manipulated media,” saying that under the social media giant’s new standard, Joe Biden’s team has uploaded its own “doctored and deceptively edited” video recently…
Trump campaign rapid response director Andrew Clark told Fox News, “Twitter shouldn’t be an enforcement arm of Joe Biden’s campaign strategy, but if they choose to police every video clip they must hold his own campaign to the same standard.”
Politico: Bloomberg aides cut loose despite year-long employment promise
By Christopher Cadelago and Sally Goldenberg
Mike Bloomberg’s shuttered presidential campaign is dismissing staffers across the country and inviting them to reapply for jobs on his new independent committee – despite extending guarantees of being paid through the November election when they were hired…
Multiple Bloomberg aides told POLITICO they participated in termination calls with the campaign on Monday. Some of them complained after the calls that they were originally told they would be paid by Bloomberg though the November general election regardless of whether he remained in the race. Most staffers will receive their last paycheck on March 31, sources said.
New York Times: How the Trump Campaign Took Over the G.O.P.
By Danny Hakim and Glenn Thrush
President Trump’s campaign manager and a circle of allies have seized control of the Republican Party’s voter data and fund-raising apparatus, using a network of private businesses whose operations and ownership are cloaked in secrecy, largely exempt from federal disclosure…
Now, by commanding the party’s repository of voter data and creating a powerful pipeline for small donations, the Trump campaign and key party officials have made it increasingly difficult for Republicans to mount modern, digital campaigns without the president’s support.
Washington Post: Bloomberg failed, but billionaires still rule U.S. politics
By Chisun Lee and Daniel Weiner
That either [Mike Bloomberg or Tom Steyer] even had a shot at the nation’s highest office shows just how important extreme private wealth has become in our political campaigns. (The same goes for former Starbucks chief executive Howard Schultz, another billionaire who moved to set up an independent campaign last year before abandoning it.) They are just the most obvious examples where the power of big money is too plain to miss. Other billionaires are shaping the race for the White House and Congress, often through super PACs and dark money groups that make their influence more difficult to spot. The need for a different system, one not captive to the whims of the super wealthy, has never been clearer.
Bloomberg’s late entry into the presidential race made his financial power seem especially jarring. With no preexisting support, he was able to launch a viable campaign in late November, vaulting past rivals who lacked similar resources but had been campaigning for months and, in some cases, had spent their professional lives in public service.
Washington Post: Joe Biden’s big vision for America: He wants to restore faith in government
By Gabriel Glickman
Joe Biden entered Washington in 1973, as Watergate unfolded, precipitating debates over campaign financing and other ethical issues. The Vietnam War and Watergate scandal had created a credibility gap and left Americans lacking faith in their government. Biden saw himself as the antidote to such distrust. He wasn’t naive. He freely acknowledged the capacity of political leaders to abuse their power. “[W]hether you like it or not, young lady,” he said to a young female journalist, interviewing him in 1974, “us cruddy politicians can take away that First Amendment of yours if we want to.” …
But Biden also had a broader cause: professionalizing politics. Doing so would create a class of morally upstanding leaders. And so, amid the larger debate about reforming campaign finance procedures – the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, the creation of the Federal Election Commission in 1974 and then the landmark Supreme Court case in 1976, Buckley v. Valeo, which struck down spending limits in politics – Biden advocated for public financing of federal campaigns and co-sponsored legislation to do just that in 1973.
Washington Free Beacon: Texas Democrat Forced Into Runoff Despite $6.5 Million in Spending from Establishment
By Collin Anderson
Despite the support of the Democratic establishment, millions of dollars in outside spending, and a significant fundraising advantage, Texas Democrat M.J. Hegar failed to secure the party’s Senate nomination Tuesday and now faces a runoff that could dampen liberal hopes of turning Texas blue in November…
Though Hegar spent more than $3 million on the primary and benefited from an additional $3.5 million in outside spending, the Texas Democrat earned just 22 percent support Tuesday, far below the majority vote needed to secure the nomination.
The States
Chicago Sun-Times: Law limits union campaign gifts, but what if they give to allies who then give to their candidate?
By Tina Sfondeles and Lauren FitzPatrick
The Service Employees International Union has a candidate it likes in the race to succeed state Rep. Art Turner II…
That’s Lakesia Collins, one of the union’s nursing home organizers…
But the timing and the amounts of the contributions raise questions about whether they violate a state cap on campaign giving.
In three instances, records examined by the Chicago Sun-Times show, union-friendly elected officials have reported receiving a campaign contribution from SEIU and then, within one month, giving that exact amount to Collins – for a total of $60,000.
Contributions are capped at $57,800 from each political action committee through November and at $11,600 from any union, corporation or association.
Sun Herald: Civil rights groups vow lawsuit over Israel boycott law
By Associated Press
Two Oklahoma civil rights groups said Monday they intend to sue the state if the Legislature passes a bill to prohibit state contracts with companies that boycott Israel.
Attorneys with the Oklahoma chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union and Council on American-Islamic Relations both say House Bill 3967, which passed the House last week, is unconstitutional…
Mike Redman, the interim director of ACLU of Oklahoma, said the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that economic and political boycotts are a form of political speech enshrined and protected by the First Amendment…
Federal judges in Arizona, Kansas and Texas have blocked similar laws from taking effect, while a judge in neighboring Arkansas let a similar law stand. The Arkansas case is currently being appealed.
San Diego Union-Tribune: State election regulators ask for help identifying source of unmarked campaign ads
By Morgan Cook
State election regulators are asking the public to help identify who is behind campaign communications for races in San Diego County that did not disclose their funding sources, as required by law.
The state’s Fair Political Practices Commission seeks help identifying three communications: a printed mailing and a yard sign opposing Carlsbad City Councilmember Cori Schumacher for election in District 1, and a robotic call promoting a website, Goldstandardslate.com that prompted listeners to choose from a vetted list of candidates running for the Republican Central Committee.
Baltimore Sun: Baltimore City Council to consider using energy tax money for public campaign financing, gives approval to security camera rebate
By Talia Richman
The Baltimore City Council will consider devoting money generated by the energy tax to the public financing of political campaigns.
Nevada Independent: Nevada Supreme Court: Statements made about Family Court are protected by First Amendment
By Tabitha Mueller
The Nevada Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Steve Sanson, the founder of controversial political organization Veterans In Politics International, by dismissing a lawsuit against him under the state’s anti-SLAPP law…
The unanimous, three-judge panel ruling on Thursday also established email listservs and proceedings in Family Court as public forums with protections under the anti-SLAPP law…
Sanson’s lawyer, Maggie McLetchie, told The Nevada Independent that the lawsuit brought against Sanson by Las Vegas-based divorce attorneys Jennifer Abrams and Marshal Willick was a “thinly veiled” attempt to stop Sanson and others from speaking about what takes place in court. Sanson is a strident critic and observer of activity within Las Vegas family courts.
