Rumble and Law Professor Sue New York Attorney General to Block Online Hate Speech Law, Calling It a First Amendment ‘Double Whammy’ | Law & Crime

Two days before New York’s online hate speech law is supposed to take effect, the video-sharing website Rumble and a law professor filed a lawsuit against New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) asking a judge to call it vague and unconstitutional.

Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a non-profit group better known by its acronym FIRE, filed the 46-page complaint on behalf of three plaintiffs: Rumble, the crowd funding site Locals, and Eugene Volokh, the First Amendment scholar behind the legal blog The Volokh Conspiracy.

“New York politicians are slapping a speech-police badge on my chest because I run a blog,” Volokh wrote in a statement. “I started the blog to share interesting and important legal stories, not to police readers’ speech at the government’s behest.”

Passed in the wake of a white supremacist’s mass shooting of Black shoppers at a grocery story in Buffalo, New York, the law forces social media networks to publish a policy explaining how they will clamp down on speech perceived to “vilify, humiliate, or incite violence against a group or class of persons” based on race, color, religion, or other protected categories. FIRE notes that those platforms will be required to create a mechanism to report such speech — and must respond to those complaints.

In their complaint, Volokh’s lawyers say that the law “hangs like the Sword of Damocles over a broad swath of online services.”

“In something of a First Amendment ‘double whammy,’ the Online Hate Speech Law burdens the publication of disfavored but protected speech through unconstitutionally compelled speech — forcing online services to single out ‘hate speech’ with a dedicated policy, a mandatory report & response mechanism, and obligatory direct replies to each report,” the professor’s lawyer Darapana M. Sheth writes in the complaint. “If a service refuses, the law threatens New York Attorney General investigations, subpoenas, and daily fines of $1,000 per violation.”

Earlier this week, Buffalo mass shooter Payton Gendron pleaded guilty to all 25 state charges leveled against him for his terrorist attack, which he live-streamed via a GoPro that he wore to the mass slaughter. He disseminated a racist rant before his shooting spree that articulated his motives, like other white supremacists before him in Christchurch, New Zealand, and elsewhere.

The Empire State law had been intended, in part, to keep racially motivated terrorists from having spaces online to spread their ideologies and stop copycat attacks.

But Volokh says that the New York law goes too far, using such broad language that any attorney general can put bloggers at risk of financial ruin, if commenters share opinions that are disfavored by the state.

Under his interpretation of the statute, the professor says that regulators can go after an atheist perceived to have “vilified” organized religion — or comedian John Oliver for his recent segment on HBO’s Last Week Tonight sending up the British monarchy, which could be construed as a “humiliation” of the U.K.

“There can be no reasonable doubt New York will enforce the Online Hate Speech Law to strong-arm online services into censoring protected speech,” the complaint states. “The Attorney General’s intentions, in fact, could not be clearer; as recited, for example, in an October press release, the Attorney General declared that ‘[o]nline platforms should be held accountable for allowing hateful and dangerous content to spread on their platforms’ because an alleged ‘lack of oversight, transparency, and accountability of these platforms allows hateful and extremist views to proliferate online.’”

Rumble, Locals and Volokh want a federal judge to declare the law unconstitutional on its face as “vague” and “overbroad.” They also seek to a declaration that it runs afoul of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a statute that has come under fire by politicians across the political spectrum. . . .

Rumble and Law Professor Sue New York Attorney General to Block Online Hate Speech Law, Calling It a First Amendment ‘Double Whammy’ | Law & Crime

Skip The Scoop | Seek Understanding

Gates and Soros-backed organization buys U.K. Covid-19 testing company for $41 million

Show Me

Wireless Radiation Exposure for Children Should Be ‘Hundreds of Times Lower’ than FCC Limits, Environmental Group Says

Show Me

Harvey Weinstein pleads not guilty to sexual assault charges in LA court

Show Me

Eliminating virus risk at Tokyo Olympics is impossible, WHO leader says

Show Me

Drug Distributors and J.& J. Announce $26 Billion Deal to End Opioids Lawsuits

Show Me

Bezos says he’s creating a space industry with Elon Musk and Richard Branson

Show Me

EXCLUSIVE: House Republicans Demand Answers From Biden Over Work With Facebook To Flag ‘Disinformation’

Show Me

GOP leader rips Pelosi for rejecting Banks, Jordan on Jan 6 panel, threatens boycott

Show Me

Biden Homeland Security Announces Travel Restrictions for Americans at Border Due to COVID Variant But Southern Border Will Remain Open to Illegals

Show Me

Canada: Modern but No Longer Very Democratic or Western

Show Me

‘Unintentional Injuries’ and the Lockdown

Show Me

(FORUM) Government and Big Tech are among biggest purveyors of misinformation on Covid

Show Me

US Surgeon General Asks Big Tech to Restrict Voices That Challenge Biden Regime Narrative on Vaccinations

Show Me

Doctors for COVID Ethics: Halt Use of Pfizer COVID Vaccines in Adolescents ‘Immediately’

Show Me

Five Times More Children Committed Suicide Than Died of Covid in First Year of UK Lockdown: Study

Show Me

‘They Should Be Fired’ – Scientist Says Washington State COVID Test Info That Prompted Lockdowns Is ‘Garbage Data’

Show Me

Germany Calls on China to Allow Further Investigations Into COVID Origins

Show Me

WHO admits errors in report of COVID origins, says will correct mistakes

Show Me

China says pandemic won’t delay 2022 Winter Olympics

Show Me

IT BEGINS: The Government Is Keeping a List of Who Has Taken the COVID Vaccine and Contacting Individuals Not Vaccinated

Show Me

California Woman Is Charged in Fake Covid-19 Vaccine Card Scheme

Show Me

Dr. Fauci Has Lied To Congress & The American People About Funding Gain Of Function Viruses | Video 6 Minutes 15 Seconds

Show Me

‘We Can All Learn From China’ – Fauci-Funded Researcher Hyped CCP Vaccines and Lockdowns on Communist State Propaganda Network.

Show Me

Carroll County summer camp suspends operations after two staff members test positive for COVID

Show Me

“Perfect Storm” of Pandemic, Poverty & Jailing Ex-President Unleashes Mass Protest in South Africa

Show Me

Luntz advised Biden’s COVID-19 team

Show Me

WHO Warns South Africa to Brace For Covid-19 Surge After Riots

Show Me

False Labelling in COVID Origin Scrutiny Reminiscent of Climate Change Debate, Observers Say

Show Me

Why The Border Crisis is a Public Health Crisis

Show Me

Covid-19 UK: Alcohol deaths reach record levels after lockdown drove binge drinking at home

Show Me

If California workers must disclose COVID-19 vaccination status, why not state lawmakers?

Show Me

8 Fully Vaccinated Health Care Workers Test Positive for CCP Virus in Las Vegas: Report

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 1 | Recorded July 21, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 37 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 2 | Recorded July 21, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 21 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Evening Edition | Recorded July 21, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 58 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 1 | Recorded July 20, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 49 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 2 | Recorded July 20, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 21 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Evening Edition | Recorded July 20, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 58 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 1 | Recorded July 19, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 24 Seconds

Show Me

Bannon’s War Room | Morning Edition Hour 2 | Recorded July 19, 2021 | Video: 48 Minutes 45 Seconds

Show Me