“The First Amendment is very plain in its wording and its meaning.”
— Disney CEO Josh D’Amaro, on the company’s court fight with the FCC
Minnesota school board silences parents
Blake and Katy DeMarais were repeatedly cut off during Foley Public School Board meetings in Minnesota for mentioning school employees by name or even job title while raising concerns about their nonverbal child’s special education services. But as Matthew Harwood writes:
There’s a good reason that school staff names and titles are public. The community has the right to know how their tax dollars are being spent and whether the public servants they pay are doing their jobs effectively, ethically, and constitutionally. How can parents in Foley public schools know if the adults in charge of their kids’ education are doing their jobs if nobody can criticize them by name or even mention their titles?
Update: Blogger found guilty over Shrek dick pic
An Ohio political blogger who sent an image of Shrek’s penis to a state senator was found guilty of telecommunications harassment today. Aaron Terr explains:
This isn’t all that surprising given the breadth of the Ohio statute under which he was was charged. The Rooster should appeal and challenge the law’s constitutionality. The First Amendment protects the right to criticize government officials, even in crude or vulgar terms. If a single electronic communication that annoys or alarms the recipient can amount to criminal harassment, that’s bad news for a lot of social media users!
Below the fold
A federal judge in D.C. heard Disney’s request to block the FCC’s early review of eight ABC station licenses, but didn’t rule.
FIRE sued the Los Angeles City Council over its ban of the words “cunt” and “nigger” during public comment.
The long view
Jacob Mchangama continues his examination of Frederick Douglass’ free speech philosophy, this time asking how the abolitionist responded to lies and personal attacks. Douglass endured decades of racist slurs, smears, and false accusations, yet appears to have threatened legal action for defamation only once. He believed newspapers had an ethical duty to let people answer attacks in the same pages where they appeared. Mchangama explains that Douglass overwhelmingly preferred counterspeech to lawsuits, and largely practiced what he preached — even when his critics turned his own printing press against him.
Podcasts
The Blessings of Liberty explores constitutional history, Supreme Court debates, and the “American Idea,” hosted by bestselling author and constitutional scholar Jeffrey Rosen.
Constitutional law and environmental law scholars Jonathan Adler and Donald Kochan join to discuss the first Supreme Court case of the new term, Suncor v. Boulder, which explores whether states, cities, and counties can sue fossil fuel producers for the harms caused by climate change.
So to Speak takes an uncensored look at the world of free expression through the law, philosophy, and stories that define free speech — hosted by FIRE’s Nico Perrino.
Nico talks with filmmaker Jim Epstein and journalist Germania Rodríguez Poleo about how Venezuela went from democracy to dictatorship. Their discussion centers on Epstein’s new documentary, Escaping Venezuela, which follows Carlos Mora, a man imprisoned and tortured for helping dissidents flee to Colombia. They trace how Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro dismantled press freedom, punished dissent, and tightened their grip on power. The episode explores how authoritarianism takes hold gradually — and what it would take to restore democracy in Venezuela.
Required reading
In The Washington Post, Andrew Doyle argues that Britain’s counterterrorism program has become a potential censorship tool after comedian John Cleese was reported to Prevent, the British government program designed to stop people from becoming terrorists. Cleese was reported over his jokes and comments about Islam. Doyle says the complaint reflects a broader trend of treating controversial opinions as signs of extremism, blurring the line between offensive speech and genuine threats. He praises Cleese for mocking the complaint and argues that disagreements over religion, immigration, and culture should be settled through open debate, not government intervention.
Today in history with Sheridan Macy
On Oct. 21, 1998, the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was passed, requiring commercial distributors of “material harmful to minors” to block minors from their sites. “Harmful to minors” followed the Supreme Court’s three-part Miller test for obscenity, from Miller v. California, which says something is obscene only if regular people find it “prurient,” offensively sexual, and clearly without serious value. Multiple cases challenged COPA, saying it restricted adults’ rights, was hard to enforce, and that local community standards don’t fit the borderless internet. In 2009, the Supreme Court let the lower court’s block stand by refusing to hear the appeal, and COPA ended.
By the numbers
PEN America’s new index counted 11,982 school book bans in the 2025-26 school year, the highest since it began tracking in 2021. Texas led with more than 8,100 after the state’s SB 13 took effect, per PEN’s press release. PEN says 72% of the districts it tracked can attribute bans to state legislation. Last year’s count was 6,870.
PEN America counts any content-based action that removes a book or restricts students’ access to it, even temporarily, as a ban, so the total includes restrictions and books pulled pending review, not just permanent removals.