A political assassination in Utah, FIRE releases 2026 College Free Speech Rankings, a marathon of media feat. yours truly, & more

Bringing you the latest free speech news (9/14/25)

Stories of the week

• Charlie Kirk’s assassination (Expression) by

  Nico Perrino

Unfortunately, since 2021, we’ve seen a steady rise in support for violence in response to speech on campus. Earlier this week, we released our finding that one in three students express some support for the use of violence to stop a campus speech. That’s up from 20 percent only three years ago. While we do not know the identity of the gunman, what happened yesterday is indicative of a broader cancer in our body politic that we must address.

• Charlie Kirk’s Horrific Killing and America’s Worsening Political Violence (New York Times) by The Editorial Board

Thirty-four percent of college students recently said they supported using violence in some circumstances to stop a campus speech, according to a poll from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression published a day before the Kirk shooting. Since 2021, that share has risen from 24 percent, which was already unacceptably high. Surveys of older adults are similarly alarming.

This week in ERI

• Five key takeaways from FIRE’s 2026 College Free Speech Rankings — released today! by

  Sean Stevens

This week in Expression

• Student acceptance of violence in response to speech hits a record high by

  Ryne Weiss
  &
  Chapin Lenthall-Cleary

• The United Kingdom needs a new generation of Levellers by

  Jacob Mchangama

All told, it is difficult to escape the depressing conclusion that the home of the Levellers, Cato’s Letters, John Wilkes, Mary Wollstonecraft, Tom Paine, John Stuart Mill, and George Orwell has taken a deeply troubling turn away from the robust tradition of free speech these seminal figures argued so eloquently for.

This week in FIRE’s blog

• We are in the cancel culture part of the tragedy cycle by

  Adam Goldstein

First, two children lost their father and a wife her husband. Then people lost their humanity. And now, a nation loses another piece of its soul. This part of the cycle is its own special kind of awful: the cancel culture machine.

• FIRE statement on the shooting of Charlie Kirk

• 2026 College Free Speech Rankings: America’s colleges get an ‘F’ for poor free speech climate

• Why we shouldn’t let the government hit mute on AI speech by John Coleman

FIRE in the press!

• College students increasingly believe violence is justifiable to stop speech (The Argument) by

  Angel Eduardo

The data is grim. More college students than ever believe that, at least in some rare circumstances, it can be acceptable for their peers to engage in violence to stop speech they don’t like. This is extremely troubling, because violence in response to speech is how our culture of free expression — and the civil society it creates — begins to crumble completely. When it comes to violence, even “rarely” is too often.

• "Authoritarians in the Academy": The National Security Law and the Shuttering of Academic Freedom in Hong Kong (Reason) by

  Sarah McLaughlin

On June 30, 2020, Beijing enforced the national security law in Hong Kong, targeting alleged acts of separatism, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign countries. It was a vaguely-worded legislative weapon handed to authorities to crush the city's vibrant democracy and protest movements. But it did even more than that. The law was also explicitly written to apply to acts committed "outside the region by a person who is not a permanent resident of the region."

• "Authoritarians in the Academy": Satellite Campuses and the Perils of Local Law (Reason) by

  Sarah McLaughlin

International free speech stories of the week

• Scrap non-crime hate incidents, says police watchdog (The Telegraph) by Martin Evans & Charles Hymas

“I think we need to separate the offensive from the criminal. We need at times to allow people to speak openly without the fear that their opinions will put them on the wrong side of the law.

“I’m a firm believer that non-crime hate incidents are no longer required, and that intelligence can be gathered in a different way, which would cause less concern to the public and would make recording of such issues much easier for policing.”

• Sierra Leone: Editor invited by CID over publication of story in newspaper, X (MFWA)

• Nepal lifts social media ban after 19 killed in protests against corruption (Al Jazeera)

• India expands censorship powers, lets lower officials demand takedowns (Al Jazeera)

Podcast marathon of the month

I’ve done what seems like dozens of interviews lately, so I figured why pick just one?

• Uncovering Britain’s Free Speech Crisis...It's Worse Than You Know (The Winston Marshall Show)

Uncovering Britain’s Free Speech Crisis...It's Worse Than You Know

• A Conversation with FIRE’s Greg Lukianoff (Free Speech Unmuted)

• ‘Bring back free speech’ (Media Confidential)