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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Trump Wants Appeals Court to Let Him Block Critics on Twitter
U.S. President Donald Trump doesn’t take kindly to his Twitter critics, and like many users of the social network he’s used the block function to prevent them from engaging with him.

But for much of the past year, Trump has been constrained by a federal judge’s ruling that he couldn’t block users because his account is a public forum. On Tuesday, lawyers for the president will urge an appeals court in Manhattan to overturn that ruling, arguing that the account belongs to him personally and isn’t controlled by the government.

The case is likely to help further clarify how government officials will be able to communicate on social media as the networks become further ingrained in daily life. While U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald’s ruling in May isn’t the only one to find that a public official can’t block critics on the networks, it’s the first to apply to the president’s feed.

"It’s a hugely significant case in terms of how government officials can use social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter and whom they can permissibly block from following them," said Clay Calvert, director of the Marion B. Brechner First Amendment Project at the University of Florida.

"Government officials can still have private accounts without triggering First Amendment concerns if they use those accounts only for non-governmental purposes,” he added. “But when it’s Trump and he uses Twitter on a daily and nightly basis to comment on government issues and to criticize politicians, then that is where the First Amendment comes into play.”


Trump has wielded Twitter as a cudgel since he joined a decade ago -- attacking his critics, blasting news coverage of his administration and offering a constant, running stream of commentary on issues from border security to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the election. He has 59.2 million followers.

Just last week, he waged a war of tweets with George Conway, a Republican lawyer who’s married to Trump’s senior adviser Kellyanne Conway and has been a fierce critic of the president.

George Conway, often referred to as Mr. Kellyanne Conway by those who know him, is VERY jealous of his wife’s success & angry that I, with her help, didn’t give him the job he so desperately wanted. I barely know him but just take a look, a stone cold LOSER & husband from hell!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 20, 2019
The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University sued Trump and White House Social Media Director Dan Scavino on behalf of seven users who were blocked by the president after they criticized him and his policies -- including Rebecca Buckhalter, a writer and political consultant, University of Maryland sociology professor Philip Cohen and political organizer and songwriter Holly Figueroa. The institute, which works to protect free speech, claims the users’ First Amendment rights were violated by the president’s action.

Trump uses Twitter “not to provide a platform for public discussion, but to disseminate his own views to the world," the president’s lawyers argued in a brief to the appeals court. "When he blocks a particular user from reading or replying to his tweets, he is exercising his right to choose with whom he will engage in speech. Nothing in the First Amendment divests him of that prerogative or compels him to receive messages that he does not wish to hear."

Sean Spicer said in June 2017, while he was White House spokesman, that Trump’s tweets should be considered official statements.

More on the judge’s ruling here

Buchwald ruled that blocking users prevented them from interacting with others who replied to Trump’s tweets -- limiting their right to speak freely. While the judge declined to order the president to take action, saying her decision should be enough, Trump unblocked the seven users and dozens of others after the ruling.

The case gives the appeals court the chance to show government officials that their decision to use social media, including Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, has consequences, said Helen Norton, a professor at the University of Colorado Law School, who is part of a group of First Amendment scholars supporting the plaintiffs in the suit.


“Government speakers need not choose to speak through platforms that permit public interaction -- for example, they can have blogs or websites without enabling comment threads,” Norton said. “When government officials speak to the public about the government’s work through platforms that permit public interaction, they enable a forum for public comment, and the First Amendment permits them to control the content of their own posts but forbids them from controlling private parties’ participation.”

The notion that the Constitution allows the government to control its own speech, but not that of others, is longstanding, Norton said. She cited the example of a city council meeting where the panel allows for public comment. It can’t stop people from expressing opposing views to those of council members.

New Technologies
“It’s not hard for governments to comply with this principle, and they’ve done so for a long time,” Norton said. “The interesting wrinkles in this case are that it involves the president, and newer expressive technologies.”

Groups including the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Georgetown Law Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection support the plaintiffs. The Coolidge-Reagan Foundation, a conservative free-speech advocate, said Buchwald’s ruling would allow a government official’s or employee’s accounts to be considered official “simply when multiple tweets they send are deemed too closely related to their work.”

Politicians from California to Florida have been sued for blocking users, and courts have mostly ruled against them.

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan agreed to implement a new social media policy to settle a suit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of four residents who had claimed he censored them by deleting their comments and blocking them from his Facebook page. In January, a federal appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, upheld a ruling finding that the chairwoman of the Loudon County Board of Supervisors had violated the First Amendment rights of a constituent by banning him from her Facebook page.

But Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin won an initial round when a federal judge denied a request for a preliminary court order barring him from blocking anyone on Twitter or Facebook.

Trump offered his own argument in support of his Twitter use to reporters before boarding Marine One last week.


"Twitter is a way that I can get out the word," Trump said. "Because our media is so dishonest, Twitter is a way that I get out the word when we have a corrupt media."
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M

member 3289

Guest
Kneeblock said:
No, what's important is that no sane American should want the President of the United States to be guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors, especially colluding with a foreign power. If evidence should show that he is, then of course he has to face consequences, but actively desiring that he should be or hoping for it even is nihilistic and short-sighted over what will follow politically. So again, I hope there's nothing there, for all our sakes.
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I'll be honest, I was hoping he was guilty
 
Splinty

Splinty

Shake 'em off
Admin
Dec 31, 2014
44,116
89,914
Based Mueller! Exonerated from the witch Hunt. I knew we could count on a loyal public servant like Mueller to do a fair and unbiased job.
 
Papi Chingon

Papi Chingon

Domesticated Hombre
Oct 19, 2015
27,354
34,204
Splinty said:
Based Mueller! Exonerated from the witch Hunt. I knew we could count on a loyal public servant like Mueller to do a fair and unbiased job.
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Now that he submitted his report I hope trump fires him. Hires all dems for the investigation, including a clinton attorney. What a fraud, and they still couldn't take down trump.
 
Lukewarm Carl

Lukewarm Carl

TMMAC Addict
Aug 7, 2015
31,000
51,649
I know that they have no control over what Google suggests for me but I do find the articles from Fox News to be hilarious considering today's information.


 
Papi Chingon

Papi Chingon

Domesticated Hombre
Oct 19, 2015
27,354
34,204
Willthiswork said:
I know that they have no control over what Google suggests for me but I do find the articles from Fox News to be hilarious considering today's information.


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If you go to fox's website you will see that the whole upper portion is dedicated to the Mueller report. I don't know why your feed is selecting stories which are secondary, unless it knows you love the spice girls and avacados.
 
M

member 3289

Guest
On the one hand, it's refreshing to know that a nonpartisan investigation reached a nonpartisan conclusion

On the other hand, I'm disappointed we don't get to impeach Trump.
 
KWingJitsu

KWingJitsu

ยาเม็ดสีแดงหรือสีฟ้ายา?
Nov 15, 2015
10,311
12,689
conor mcgregor nut hugger said:
On the one hand, it's refreshing to know that a nonpartisan investigation reached a nonpartisan conclusion

On the other hand, I'm disappointed we don't get to impeach Trump.
Click to expand...
...on this issue.

But .... After Mueller: The Ongoing Investigations Surrounding Trump

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York
At least three investigations in this district have not yet concluded. Prosecutors are reportedly looking into the financial dealings of Trump’s inauguration committee, which took in a record $107 million for the festivities surrounding his inauguration, in January 2017. In February, prosecutors subpoenaed a wide range of documents from the inauguration committee, and investigators seem particularly interested in whether it took money from donors connected to Middle Eastern governments.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia
Three unresolved cases are in this district. Kamil Ekim Alptekin, an associate of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, was indicted and charged for acting as an agent of the Turkish government and lying to the FBI. He has not appeared in court and, as far as we know, hasn’t been arrested; his case is unlikely to be resolved quickly for that reason. Another Flynn associate, Bijan Kian, is still awaiting trial for failing to register as a foreign agent after working on behalf of the Turkish government.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia
The ongoing cases in the D.C. District Court are almost all related to the WikiLeaks release of hacked emails from the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic Party. A number of Trump associates charged as part of the Mueller probe are still awaiting sentencing in this district as well.

Department of Justice (Public Integrity Section)
In August 2018, The Washington Post reported that the Department of Justice was investigating Elliott Broidy, a prominent Republican fundraiser, for possibly attempting to cash in on his connections with the Trump administration by requesting millions of dollars from foreign governments in exchange for pushing the administration to take actions benefiting those countries.

Other State and Local Investigations
In addition to the investigations in New York, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., that are directly related to Mueller’s probe, other jurisdictions are conducting numerous investigations into various people and organizations with connections to Trump.

State Attorneys General Investigating Trump’s Inauguration Committee
The attorneys general of Washington, D.C., and New Jersey, like investigators in the Southern District of New York, have each subpoenaed the records of Trump’s inauguration committee, indicating a widening prosecutorial interest into that committee’s practices.

New York State and New York City
At least four ongoing investigations are happening at the state and local level in New York. The tax departments for both New York State and New York City have opened investigations into Trump’s taxes after a New York Times investigation found that Trump benefited from a $400 million tax scheme.



So yeah there's still plenty of "drama fo' yo mama", regarding the Trump Criminal Enterprise.
 
Sheepdog

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,224
Pretty amazing effort by Hillary Clinton.

We thought it was impressive that she was able to lose the Democrats one election vs Donald Trump, but she was able to go one better by peddling a conspiracy theory and now losing them the next one too.
 
Hauler

Hauler

Been fallin so long it's like gravitys gone
Feb 3, 2016
47,475
59,400
KWingJitsu said:
...on this issue.

But .... After Mueller: The Ongoing Investigations Surrounding Trump

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York
At least three investigations in this district have not yet concluded. Prosecutors are reportedly looking into the financial dealings of Trump’s inauguration committee, which took in a record $107 million for the festivities surrounding his inauguration, in January 2017. In February, prosecutors subpoenaed a wide range of documents from the inauguration committee, and investigators seem particularly interested in whether it took money from donors connected to Middle Eastern governments.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia
Three unresolved cases are in this district. Kamil Ekim Alptekin, an associate of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, was indicted and charged for acting as an agent of the Turkish government and lying to the FBI. He has not appeared in court and, as far as we know, hasn’t been arrested; his case is unlikely to be resolved quickly for that reason. Another Flynn associate, Bijan Kian, is still awaiting trial for failing to register as a foreign agent after working on behalf of the Turkish government.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia
The ongoing cases in the D.C. District Court are almost all related to the WikiLeaks release of hacked emails from the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic Party. A number of Trump associates charged as part of the Mueller probe are still awaiting sentencing in this district as well.

Department of Justice (Public Integrity Section)
In August 2018, The Washington Post reported that the Department of Justice was investigating Elliott Broidy, a prominent Republican fundraiser, for possibly attempting to cash in on his connections with the Trump administration by requesting millions of dollars from foreign governments in exchange for pushing the administration to take actions benefiting those countries.

Other State and Local Investigations
In addition to the investigations in New York, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., that are directly related to Mueller’s probe, other jurisdictions are conducting numerous investigations into various people and organizations with connections to Trump.

State Attorneys General Investigating Trump’s Inauguration Committee
The attorneys general of Washington, D.C., and New Jersey, like investigators in the Southern District of New York, have each subpoenaed the records of Trump’s inauguration committee, indicating a widening prosecutorial interest into that committee’s practices.

New York State and New York City
At least four ongoing investigations are happening at the state and local level in New York. The tax departments for both New York State and New York City have opened investigations into Trump’s taxes after a New York Times investigation found that Trump benefited from a $400 million tax scheme.



So yeah there's still plenty of "drama fo' yo mama", regarding the Trump Criminal Enterprise.
Click to expand...
 
Sheepdog

Sheepdog

Protecting America from excessive stool loitering
Dec 1, 2015
8,912
14,224
KWingJitsu said:
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None of which ultimately led to any concrete evidence that the Trump campaign engaged in the type of conspiratorial activity that was the point of the investigation.

Trump is a crook surrounded by crooks. But by jumping at shadows and trying to go after him for a wild conspiracy rather than the shit he actually did do, that matters less than it ever did now.

He's had a massive win on this.
 
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