EU answers X with W, Minnesota is a First Amendment crash course (or trainwreck?)! Miami Beach Police take page out of UK’s playbook! The government continues targeting protected expression, & more!
Bringing you the latest free speech news (1/25/26)
Story of the week
If, on the other hand, W is being positioned to occupy the market following an EU ban on X, then the new “competitor” is really part of the EU’s increasingly sinister strategy to censor outsiders and keep an uncomfortable level of control on the information ecology. W is nominally publicly owned but will almost certainly be dominated by EU policies and norms.
The Campaign to Crush Free Speech in Minnesota (The Free Press) by me
Speech is not violence. Protest is not conspiracy. Criticism is not incitement. Violence is not speech. And disruption of private spaces is not protest. When we blur those lines, we don’t advance justice; we empower whoever currently has the authority to determine what those words mean. The First Amendment exists to deny the government the knee-jerk ability to decide which dissent is too dangerous, irritating, or inconvenient to tolerate during tense moments.
This week in ERI
These examples demonstrate why the First Amendment sets the bar so high for its few, narrow exceptions. Democracy requires ample breathing room to speak about public issues. If sharp but non-threatening criticism and political commentary can be treated as unlawful incitement, freedom of speech ceases to exist in any meaningful sense.
This week in Expression
Anti-ICE protesters disrupted worship in a Minnesota church. Here’s why the First Amendment doesn’t protect their actions by Samuel J. Abrams
Can Congress subpoena a journalist for reporting a Delta Force commander’s name? by Jacob Gaba
How political power shapes perceptions of free speech by Nate Honeycutt
No, you can’t make students stand for the Pledge of Allegiance by Carrie Robison
This week on So to Speak
This week, So to Speak host & FIRE EVP Nico Perrino sat down with Pouya Nikmand, an Iranian-born writer and dissident, to discuss recent protests in his home country and how his life experience informs his thoughts on free speech. Check out his Substack, Outliving Iran!
This week in FIRE’s blog
There are few things more un-American than masked agents throwing dissenters in the back of a van because the government doesn’t like what they have to say. But these documents prove that it was the students’ opinions alone, and not any criminal activity, that led to handcuffs and deportation proceedings. The First Amendment means the government cannot punish speakers for their opinions, but that is exactly what the government is doing.
This can’t happen in a free society. It can’t happen in a free America. We’ll continue to fight this egregious violation of the Constitution every step of the way.
London Calling: Ronnie’s First Amendment Roundup
Massachusetts federal judge issues final judgment protecting lawfully present noncitizen AAUP and MESA members from immigration-related sanctions for engaging in protected speech
(w/ thanks to FIRE Supervising Sr. Attorney Conor Fitzpatrick)
This week the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts entered a final “Annotated Judgment” in the American Association of University Professors and the Middle Eastern Studies Association’s Administrative Procedure Act challenge to the Trump administration’s targeting of pro-Palestinian speakers for deportation, creating significant and novel procedural protection against immigration retaliation. The court voided and set aside the targeting policy and declared it illegal (though what that policy is may be a subject of further clarification and litigation). As an additional remedy, it ordered that members of the two primary plaintiffs, AAUP and MESA, shall have a procedural tool available to challenge attempted deportations: Under the judgement, any AAUP or MESA member whose immigration status is targeted may institute a “Sanction Action” in their local federal district court. Upon a showing they were a member of AAUP or MESA between March 25, 2025, and September 30, 2025, it “shall be presumed that the alteration in immigration status is in retribution” for their speech, and that presumption “voids the alteration in the immigration status unless the government proves by clear and convincing evidence” that the change in status was for a legitimate, lawful reason. The judgment further provides that upon the filing of a Sanction Action, the plaintiff’s removal from the country is automatically stayed for its duration.
International free speech stories of the week
Hong Kong begins national security trial of Tiananmen vigil group (Reuters) by Jessie Pang & James Pomfret
Egypt: Poet Ahmed Douma arrested for speaking up against human rights violations in prisons (PEN Int’l)
Sentenced to Five Years for Disrupting ‘The Natural State of Tranquility and Security That Characterizes’ Cuba (Translating Cuba)
Jack Kirby appreciation post of the month
When most people think of comic book creators, most of them probably (and understandably) think of Stan Lee. But as everyone who follows me knows at this point, I am partial to the man they called the king! The great Jack Kirby. Without the incredible art and ingenuity of Jack Kirby, comics — both Marvel and DC comics — would not be what they are today. While he was absolutely essential for the early years of Marvel, making the Fantastic Four’s first 100 issues some of the most important in comic history, he also revolutionized DC during a brief stint there, giving them their most interesting villain in Darkseid and one of their coolest concepts in the New Gods.
Here’s a great video showcasing why and how Kirby’s work revolutionized the medium, and how he has now reached Peter Paul Rubens status.
Excellent roundup. The Miami Beach example really gets atthe core issue tho -- when police show up at your door for facebook posts, the process itself becomes the punishment. Even if charges never stick, most people will self-censor after that experience. I saw this play out with a colleague once and the effect was immediate.
I feel like it's the Twilight Zone. We're all going to find out in the end that it was just a big misunderstanding, right?