→ Counsel for Knight Institute: Jameel Jaffer, the Knight Institute’s executive director, and Katie Fallow, a senior staff attorney at the Institute, will argue before the court, and several plaintiffs in the lawsuit will be in attendance.
→ For more information about the lawsuit, including the latest filings, go here.
Related: This from First Amendment Watch: President Trump, Other Elected Officials Block ‘Disliked’ Twitter Followers, March 3, 2018
Headline: “Haling The First Amendment: NYC Taxi Authority’s Ad Ban Struck Down”
Over at Forbes, Glenn Lammi writes: Taxicab, livery, black car, and limousine companies in the Big Apple may own the vehicles their employees drive, but they know full well who really controls them: the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC). Passenger transportation is one of the city’s most heavily regulated businesses, but as a federal district court judge recently reminded TLC, those small business still have constitutional rights.”
“. . . In 2015, media-distribution company Vugo sought to partner with Uber, Lift, and other rideshare company drivers in New York City. Those drivers would download Vugo software onto a tablet device that would be displayed to riders. Vugo would pay each driver 60% of the ad revenue generated from their tablets. Because ridesharing falls into the “other” category of TLC-regulated for-hire vehicles, and TLC made it clear that it would not approve any rideshare drivers’ requests for interior advertising, Vugo could not proceed with its expansion plans. In response, Vugo filed a First Amendment challenge against TLC in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.”
“Southern District Judge Ronnie Abrams held on February 22, 2018 (Vugo v. City of New York) that TLC’s ban abridged Vugo’s commercial-speech rights. . . .”
New First Amendment Group — Speech First
It seems that the five freedoms of the First Amendment are getting ever more allies. The latest is a group known as SPEECH FIRST. Here is some information about the group headed by Nicole Neily, president of Speech First.
Students’ speech rights on campus are threatened on a regular basis. But the prospect of standing up to a school can be overwhelming – it can be expensive and time-consuming (not to mention awkward, since the student probably still wants a diploma at the end of the day). That’s why most students don’t take action. But what if students who wanted to stand up for free speech on campus were supported by like-minded students from all over the country? And what if those students were part of an organization that had the resources to fight back? Suddenly, it’s not so daunting after all.