Source: https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/conlaw/2014/10/index.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 20:34:51+00:00

Document:
Judge Reggie B. Walton (D.D.C.) yesterday dismissed an action by True the Vote against the IRS for politicized foot-dragging on its 501(c)(3), not-for-profit application. The ruling ends True the Vote's case against the IRS, with very little chance of a successful appeal.
True the Vote sued the IRS after the agency took a long time with its 501(c)(3) application and requested additional information from the organization before granting not-for-profit status. True the Vote argued that the IRS did this because True the Vote was a politically conservative organization aligned with the Tea Party, in violation of the First Amendment, the IRC, and the APA.
But Judge Walton dismissed the organization's claims for declaratory and injunctive relief as moot, after the IRS ultimately granted 501(c)(3) status, leaving nothing more for the court to order in terms of relief. The court also ruled that the "voluntary cessation" exception didn't apply, because the IRS, by the plaintiff's own reckoning (and the court's judicial notice), "suspended" its "targeting scheme" on June 30, 2013, and wouldn't re-engage in the footdragging.
Finally, Judge Walton dismissed the plaintiff's statutory claim that the IRS requested and inspected more information than necessary from True the Vote, because the IRC allows it to do that.
True the Vote can appeal, but Judge Walton's ruling is likely to be upheld.
Press reports, including a segment on Democracy Now, make clear that the statute is directed at Mumia Abu-Jamal (pictured right). Before signing the bill, the Governor reportedly visited a plaque commemorating the police officer Abu-Jamal was convicted of killing; the Governor was accompanied by the police officer's widow. The Governor's remarks stated that "convicted felons in prison" have "surrendered their rights" and further that "nobody has a right to continually taunt the victims of their violent crimes in the public square."
Whether any injunction against Mumia Abul-Jamal for making a speech to a graduating class - - - seemingly the incident that provoked this law - - - could survive a First Amendment challenge is doubtful. Recall that the United States Supreme Court held unconstitutional the so-called "Son of Sam" law in Simon & Schuster v. Crime Victims Board (1991). More recently, the Court decided Snyder v. Phelps (2011) essentially holding that free speech trumped the tort of intentional infliction of emotional distress. As for prisoners, the applicable standard under Turner v. Safley (1987) interrogates the curtailment of First Amendment rights in relation to "legitimate penological interests." Here, it seems, the government interest is far removed from penological interests, but instead focuses upon the interests of preventing "revictimization."
This might make an excellent in-class exercise for ConLawProfs. Or perhaps it is so easy?
It's sure to be challenged.
UPDATE: And here's the challenge.
the complaint plausibly alleges that the plaintiffs are subject to a regulatory permitting scheme that grants an official unbridled discretion over the licensing of their expressive conduct and poses a real and substantial threat of censorship. No more is exigible to give the plaintiffs standing to proceed with their challenge.
The First Circuit largely relied on City of Lakewood v. Plain Dealer Publishing Co., 486 U.S. 750 (1988) in which the Court held unconstitutional a municipal scheme giving the mayor the power to grant or deny applications for annual permits to publishers to place their newsracks on public property; the Court allowed the publishers to proceed with the facial challenge although they had not yet applied for a permit. The First Circuit thus rejected Massachusetts' claim that the company could not show injury in fact because the company "had applied for over seventy permits without having a single application denied." For the court, it was "too optimistic" to think that the "censorship risks are only theoretical." Instead, it noted that the company "is a large, repeat player in the world of outdoor advertising" and "it may plausibly fear incurring the Director's ire any time an existing or potential client seeks to display what might be deemed a controversial message."
The factual premise of the Commonwealth's thesis is simply wrong. It confuses a recognized category of First Amendment analysis — commercial speech simpliciter — with something quite different: those who have a commercial interest in protected expression.
The court ends its opinion with the statement that it expresses "no opinion on the merits of Van Wagner's First Amendment claim."
To say more about standing would be supererogatory. The short of it is that Van Wagner has plausibly alleged that it is subject to a regulatory permitting scheme that chills protected expression by granting a state official unbridled discretion over the licensing of its expressive conduct. It follows — as night follows day — that Van Wagner has standing to mount a facial challenge to that regulatory permitting scheme.
The court mentioned but stated it was not considering Massachusetts' argument that the scheme's numerous factors howed that the discretion was not unbridled but properly cabined. The district judge will now be taking up this very question under First Amendment doctrine.
Judge John Sedwick's opinion in Connolly v. Jeanes is a mere four pages, noting that the requirement of a "lengthy and detailed opinion" is now obviated because as the district court is bound by the Ninth Circuit's opinion in Latta v. Otter. As to a stay, an "appeal to the Ninth Circuit would be futile" and given the Supreme Court's denial of petitions for writs of certiorari, it is "also clear" that the "High Court will turn a deaf ear on any request for relief from the Ninth Circuit's decision."
Despite the recent activity by Justice Kennedy including the stay and modified stay and vacated stay of the Ninth Circuit's decision, the Attorney General Tom Horne (pictured) agreed in a statement (video here) and cited his ethical duties under Rule 11 and not to "waste the taxpayers' money." He issued a letter to the clerks "effective immediately."
The Fifth Circuit this week stayed an earlier district court judgment and injunction against Texas's voter ID law, SB 14. Unless the Supreme Court steps in, this means that SB 14 will apply to November's elections.
The Fifth Circuit action is not a ruling on the merits, however. Instead, it preserves the status quo under SB 14, pending appeal of the district court judgment to the Fifth Circuit.
The case is now before the Supreme Court, where the government and others have filed emergency applications to vacate the Fifth Circuit's stay.
This is just the latest of four cases challenging state elections laws that has gone to the Supreme Court this fall, just before the elections, all on emergency applications related to lower court injunctions, and not on the merits. The Court halted Wisconsin's voter ID law; it allowed restrictions on early voting in Ohio; and it allowed restrictions on same-day voter registration and voting in the wrong precinct in North Carolina.
The controversial Texas law limiting abortion access known as HB 2, which began law despite a well-publicized filibuster by state senator Wendy Davis, is now effectively enjoined - - - in part - - -by the United States Supreme Court in its Order in Whole Woman's Health Center v. Lakey.
The application to vacate stay of final judgment pending appeal presented to Justice Scalia and by him referred to the court is granted in part and denied in part. The Court of Appeals’ stay order with reference to the district court’s order enjoining the admitting-privileges requirement as applied to the McAllen and El Paso clinics is vacated. The Court of Appeals’ stay order with reference to the district court’s order enjoining the ambulatory surgical center requirement is vacated. The application is denied in all other respects.
Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas, and Justice Alito would deny the application in its entirety.
To recap: the United States Supreme Court is vacating the Fifth Circuit stay of the district judge's injunction against portions of the law, thus reinstating the district judge's injunction at least in part.Recall also that this is an as-applied challenge. A panel of the Fifth Circuit in March upheld the admitting privileges provision after it had issued a stay of Judge Yeakel's decision enjoining the provision as unconstitutional.
Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos (S.D. Tex.) ruled today that Texas's new voter ID law violated the Constitution and entered "a permanent and final injunction against enforcement of the voter identification provisions . . . of SB 14." Judge Ramos concluded that "SB 14 creates an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote, has an impermissible discriminatory effect against Hispanics and African-Americans, and was imposed with an unconstitutional discriminatory purpose." Judge Ramos also held that "SB 14 constitutes an unconstitutional poll tax."
Judge Ramos ordered Texas to "return to enforcing the voter identification requirements for in-person voting in effect immediately prior to the enactment and implementation of SB 14."
We posted on Texas's move to implement its new voter ID law immediately in the wake of Shelby County.
The ruling comes the same day as the Supreme Court vacated an earlier Seventh Circuit stay of a district court injunction against Wisconsin's voter ID law.
The Supreme Court this evening vacated the Seventh Circuit stay of an earlier district court injunction halting Wisconsin's voter ID law. (The Seventh Circuit upheld the state's voter ID law earlier this week.) This latest chapter in this dizzying case means that Wisconsin will almost surely not have voter ID in the upcoming elections. It also means that the Court may once again take up voter ID.
The Supreme Court order was brief, just one page, and said only that "the Seventh Circuit's stay of the district court's permanent injunction injunction is vacated pending the timely filing and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari . . . ." The stay will terminate if the Court denies cert.
Justice Alito dissented, joined by Justices Scalia and Thomas. Justice Alito wrote that the Seventh Circuit's ruling wasn't unreasonable, or "demonstrably" erroneous. Justice Alito alluded to the problem of absentee ballots going out without a notice of the voter ID requirement, suggesting that these problems may have driven the Court to intervene.
Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly (D.D.C.) this week rejected a non-profit's challenge to the disclosure provisions in the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002. The ruling was unsurprising, even if the case may be noteworthy, as it represents a next wave of challenges to campaign finance regulation.
The Independence Institute, a Colorado non-profit, sought declaratory and injunctive relief against FEC enforcement of BCRA's disclosure requirement as applied to a specific radio ad that the Institute planned to run before the fall elections. The Institute argued that the requirement was overbroad as applied, because the planned ad was genuine issue advocacy, and not express advocacy.
This dispute can be distilled to the application of the Supreme Court's clear instructions in Citizens United: in no uncertain terms, the Supreme Court rejected the attempt to limit BCRA's disclosure requirements to express advocacy and its functional equivalent. Plaintiff in this case seeks the same relief that has already been foreclosed by Citizens United.
Judge Kollar-Kotelly then rejected the Institute's attempts to distinguish Citizens United, ruled in favor of the FEC, and upheld the disclosure requirement.
This ruling was hardly surprising: if a court is going to overturn disclosure requirements, it'll have to be the Supreme Court. Still, the case should get our attention as a next-wave challenge to campaign speech regulation--the challenge to disclosure requirements.
The New Color Lines: What Will It Mean to Be an American?

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