Email from The Institute for Free Speech The Latest News from the Institute for Free Speech September 23, 2025 Click here to subscribe to the Daily Media Update. This is the Daily Media Update published by the Institute for Free Speech. For press inquiries, please contact [email protected]. In the News Concord Monitor: Kearsarge school district settles free speech lawsuit for $33,000 By Jeremy Margolis .....The Kearsarge Regional School District’s insurer will pay more than $30,000 to settle a lawsuit filed after the school board chair barred an activist from calling a transgender student a “tall boy” during a meeting last August. Beth Scaer of Nashua, a vocal opponent of allowing transgender students to participate in sports corresponding with their gender identity, sued the school district in May for violating her First Amendment rights. The settlement, which the Concord Monitor obtained through a public records request, directs the school district’s insurer, Primex, to pay lawyers for Scaer $33,000 and to pay her the symbolic amount of $17.91, a nod to the year when the Bill of Rights was ratified. That money will come exclusively from the insurer rather than from the district’s operating budget, according to Superintendent John Fortney. The settlement also requires the district to eliminate a school board practice of barring “derogatory comments,” which board chair Alison Mastin cited when she prevented Scaer from describing the physical appearance of the student, who was present at the meeting. Daily Texan: Texas Legislature establishes free speech in higher education committees By Kendall Meachum .....David Keating, president of the Institute for Free Speech, said he did not see a reason to ban the group from campus. “I can understand why people are upset about it,” Keating said. “The First Amendment protects repulsive speech as well because we don’t want the government deciding what’s repulsive and what isn’t.” Keating said he thinks the free speech committees have a good goal. However, Keating said the results will depend on how seriously legislators will take this job and whether they are going into the study with preconceived notions. “To the extent that we can create a better environment where people can be more tolerant of each other’s views, then that would be a good thing,” Keating said. “We’ll see what they come up with.” Supreme Court The Daily Caller: Government Lists Are A Threat To Free Association By Marc Wheat .....No government official needs to know what organizations you financially support. And no state attorney general should have access to Americans’ sensitive personal information without clearly showing cause or in the absence of criminal proceedings. Yet, wielding state power for his own political agenda, New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin asked a court to force First Choice Women’s Resource Centers to disclose donor information about nearly 5,000 contributions (see AAF’s amicus brief in First Choice Women’s Resource Center v. Platkin). The Courts Jonesing for Nonprofits: Johnson Amendment Case Set for Oral Arguments By Darryll K. Jones .....The Court has set oral arguments in National Religious Broadcasters v. Danny Werfel for November 7, 2025. That’s the case presenting a challenge to the Johnson Amendment’s application to houses of worship. The plaintiffs and defendants have proposed a consent decree that would enshrine into law, perhaps nationwide, the Service’s longstanding policy of not enforcing 501(c)(3)’s campaign intervention prohibition against houses of worship. There are a ton of amicus briefs on both sides, indicating the high degree of attention devoted to the case. Because of that, and with arguments — on the proposed consent decree as well as Americans United’s motion to intervene — set for November 7, I would guess the Court won’t issue a ruling until March or April next year. Congress House Judiciary Committee: Google Admits Censorship Under Biden; Promises to End Bans of YouTube Accounts of Thousands of Americans Censored for Political Speech .....Today, thanks to the oversight of Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), Google commits to offer all creators previously kicked off YouTube due to political speech violations on topics such as COVID-19 and elections an opportunity to return to the platform. Google also admitted the following to the House Judiciary Committee: The Biden Administration pressured Google to censor Americans and remove content that did not violate YouTube's policies. The Biden Administration censorship pressure was "unacceptable and wrong." Public debate should never come at the expense of relying "authorities." The company will never use third-party "fact-checkers." Europe's censorship laws target American companies and threaten American speech, including the removal of "lawful content." These major admissions come after Chairman Jordan's subpoena to Google and a years long investigation into the company. Read the full letter from Google here. Trump Administration CBS News: Trump signs executive order calling antifa a "domestic terrorist organization" By Joe Walsh .....President Trump signed an executive order Monday labeling antifa a "domestic terrorist organization" — though the move's legal impact is unclear. The executive order directs Trump administration officials to investigate and thwart "any and all illegal operations" allegedly carried out by antifa members, and to pursue people who "fund such operations" or provide material support to them. Free Expression The Conversation: New York Times v Sullivan: the 60-year old Supreme Court judgment that press freedom depends on in Trump era By Emma Long .....In 1964, the Supreme Court understood the importance of the context in which the case had been brought, namely the civil rights movement. In the 1960s, libel suits were used by southern states to attempt to control news coverage of civil rights demonstrations. Officials knew that white southern juries would not find in favour of northern newspapers sympathetic to desegregation. When the Supreme Court considered its judgment in Sullivan, the New York Times was facing 11 other libel suits in Alabama alone with a total of more than US$5 million at stake. CBS was defending five libel suits in southern states with a total cost of almost $2 million. Fearful of unfavourable verdicts and monetary damages that risked bankruptcy, some media outlets limited or stopped outright coverage of civil rights protests, just as southern segregationists wanted. This was what the court called a “chilling effect … on First Amendment freedoms”. Fear of consequences can limit people’s willingness to speak out, and self-censorship takes the place of official regulation. In such a context of intimidation, warned the court, “the pall of fear and timidity imposed upon those who would give voice to public criticism is an atmosphere in which the first amendment freedoms cannot survive”. Americans today of all political persuasions would be wise to pay attention. Good, effective political debate can only happen when participants do not fear or risk retaliation for critical commentary. Politics was also no place for the thin-skinned, warned the justices in 1964. The commitment to first amendment freedoms meant debate “should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and […] it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials”. A public official, wrote Justice Arthur Goldberg in concurrence, “must expect that his official acts will be commented upon and criticised”. New York Times: Speech for Me but Not for Thee By Suzanne Nossel .....On our accelerating social media treadmill, people are incentivized to respond to speech before taking the time to understand it. In the internet age, in which retorts live indefinitely, misinterpretations are virtually impossible to undo. Consequences of free speech need to be proportionate, lest they eviscerate the freedom itself. Reason: America's Free Speech Culture Is Under Attack From Within By J.D. Tuccille ....."Sorry, but the FCC was established by FDR to impose public standards on broadcasters and used by JFK to pressure station managers into dropping right-wing radio programs," posted conservative activist Christopher Rufo. "The 'shoe has been on the other foot' for almost a hundred years. Turnabout is fair play." Rufo is right that the FCC (originally the Federal Radio Commission) was established to bring broadcast media under government control. First, it set out to thwart evolving property rights in the broadcast spectrum that could keep radio stations independent, as documented in Jonathan W. Emord's Freedom, Technology, and the First Amendment (1991). After that, then-President Franklin Delano Roosevelt used the FCC to drive his critics from the airways. Former President John F. Kennedy emulated that tactic (with IRS audits added) in the 1960s. Trump's use of the FCC to silence voices he doesn't like is turnabout. It also violates his Inauguration Day promise to end the practice of "exerting substantial coercive pressure on third parties, such as social media companies, to moderate, deplatform, or otherwise suppress speech that the Federal Government did not approve." And it ends the pretense that the FCC serves a legitimate purpose. Clearly, it exists now (like much of the government) primarily to serve as a weapon in the hands of whoever holds power to strike at enemies. If that's all the government is, there's no reason to play by the rules at all. New York Times: Jimmy Kimmel’s Show to Return to ABC on Tuesday Night By John Koblin .....Jimmy Kimmel is coming back. ABC said on Monday that “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” would return to its airwaves on Tuesday, ending an impasse that began last week. The States The Texas Tribune: While praising Charlie Kirk’s commitment to free speech, Texas leaders move to punish students celebrating his death By Eleanor Klibanoff .....Last week, as Texas State students gathered to mourn the assassination of conservative political activist Charlie Kirk, another student began taunting them. “Hi, my name is Charlie Kirk,” he announced, before collapsing to the ground, pretending to be shot. As he walked away, someone on video can be heard saying, “you’re going to get expelled, dude.” Gov. Greg Abbott agreed, telling the university on social media to “expel this student immediately. Mocking assassination must have consequences.” Texas State President Kelly Damphouse later confirmed that the student was no longer enrolled, explaining in a statement that the university “will not tolerate behavior that mocks, trivializes, or promotes violence.” Eugene Volokh, a First Amendment expert at UCLA and Stanford, read those statements skeptically. “Mocking assassination is protected by the First Amendment,” he said. “Speech that mocks, trivializes or promotes violence is protected by the First Amendment, generally speaking.” Reason: Michigan Anti-Porn Bill Would Criminalize ASMR, Written Erotica, and Even Nonsexual Depictions of Trans People By Elizabeth Nolan Brown .....An "Anticorruption of Public Morals Act" sounds like something out of the Victorian era. But far from the brainchild of Comstock-era Progressive scold, it's a new bill in Michigan. Introduced September 11 by state Rep. Josh Schriver (R–Oxford), the act would ban the online distribution of material "that corrupts the public morals." The legislation—House Bill 4938—defines such material as any "depiction, description, or simulation, whether real, animated, digitally generated, written, or auditory, of sexual acts." Distributing it would be a felony crime, punishable by up to 20 years in prison and/or a fine of up to $100,000. Individuals, commercial entities, internet platforms, and public institutions could all be held criminally liable. Read an article you think we would be interested in? Send it to Tiffany Donnelly at [email protected]. For email filters, the subject of this email will always begin with "Institute for Free Speech Media Update." The Institute for Free Speech is a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that promotes and defends the political rights to free speech, press, assembly, and petition guaranteed by the First Amendment. 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