by Chris Walker | Jul 2, 2026 | Department of Defense, First Amendment, freedom of the press, News, Pentagon
A federal judge has blocked, for now, a Department of Defense (DOD) policy that limits press access to the Pentagon, the latest in a series of attempts by the Trump administration to restrict press freedoms in the building. The policy in question required reporters to be escorted onto the premises by DOD officials, and closely followed as they seek to speak with sources.
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by Ibrahim Hirsi | Jul 1, 2026 | antifa, Criminalization, criminalization of dissent, criminalizing dissent, Dissent, Fascism, First Amendment, free speech, ICE, intimidation, Minneapolis, Minnesota, News, Prairieland, Protests, Repression, solidarity, Texas, Trump Administration
Minnesota activists and scholars are decrying the recent federal indictment of 15 people who took part in demonstrations against the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities metro region earlier this year. The indictment accuses the protesters of surveilling federal agents, disrupting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations…
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by Schuyler Mitchell | Jun 25, 2026 | FBI, First Amendment, free speech, ICE, News, Policing, Protests, Repression, Social Media, Spokane, Surveillance, Washington State
On the evening of June 11, 2025, Shailynn Bray-Waters joined hundreds of other protesters at a demonstration outside an ICE field office in Spokane, Washington. She’d learned through social media that two of her former ESL students — Cesar Alexander Alvarez Perez and Joswar Slater Rodriguez Torres, both lawful asylum seekers from Venezuela — had been detained during a routine immigration check-in.
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by Chris Walker | Jun 24, 2026 | Damon Landor, First Amendment, News, Rastafarian spiritual movement, Religion, Religious Freedom, Supreme Court
In a Monday morning decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against a formerly incarcerated individual, denying his right to sue the state of Louisiana for violating his Rastafarian beliefs by forcibly shaving his hair. The case is notable in that, while this iteration of the high court has made numerous decisions defending right-wing Christians’ purported First Amendment religious freedoms…
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by Isiah Holmes | Jun 23, 2026 | Donald Trump, First Amendment, ICE, News, Palestine Activist, Salah Sarsour
Salah Sarsour, a Muslim leader in Milwaukee and the president of Wisconsin’s largest mosque, who was arrested by immigration agents in late March, has been ordered released by a federal judge. The news comes after sustained pressure from Sarsour’s family, his community and elected officials. “We are ecstatic for Salah Sarsour and his family that they will soon be reunited…
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by Michael Fox and Marc Steiner | Jun 11, 2026 | First Amendment, free speech, history, Podcast, Politics and Movements: US, The Battle for Free Speech, The Cultural Front
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. It will be updated as soon as possible.
Michael Fox: Hi Mark.
Marc Steiner: Hey Mike, how you doing? Good to see you.
Michael Fox: Good to see you.
Marc Steiner: What do you got for us today?
Michael Fox: All right. So late last fall I visited this place that I think you’ll appreciate for this episode. Sprout Plaza at the University of California campus.
Marc Steiner: I know exactly where you were.
Michael Fox: So it’s a beautiful blue sky out. Leaves are changing colors. It’s a crisp autumn afternoon and in front of me is this big long stoic building marble, four big long Roman columns at the top of a row of stairs. This is the administration building here at the University of California Berkeley and this is called Sproul Hall. And that is important because this was literally ground zero for the free speech movement of 1964 here at the University of California Berkeley. Like the Plaza where I’m at right now, which is Sprout Plaza, was where you just had daily marches, protests, speeches just constantly happening.
I think it is really poignant that on the ground in front of Sprout Hall, someone has written in chalk, Trump must go now, refuse fascism. And it’s chalked up in two different locations here. People still staking out their territory, demanding their right to speak their voice. I was there to get a sense of the feeling being there and kind of the legacy today. And of course this was ground zero for the free speech movement. And Mark, that’s something you know