This article was originally published in Daily Kos.
By Alan Singer
Free speech cuts both ways.
Kevin Newsom is a Trump nominated Judge on the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit including Georgia, Florida, and Alabama. Newsom, a member of the ultra-conservative Federalist Society was Solicitor General of Alabama where he defended questionable death penalty practices and tried to restrict civil rights and substantive due process. He was only appointed to the Court of Appeals because Alabama Republican Senators Jeff Sessions and Richard Shelby blocked an Obama appointee for a year until Trump took office.
Newsom has written major court opinions defending free speech on college campuses for rightwing groups and blocking efforts to regulate social media, decisions that may ultimately defend free speech for all campus protesters and speakers. The plaintiff in Speech First Inc v. Cartwright is suing administrators at the University of Central Florida for establishing anti-hate speech guidelines. It is also involved in court actions against the University of Houston, the University of Michigan, the University of Texas, the University of Illinois, and Iowa State University.
Speech First calls itself a nationwide community of free speech supporters who are opposed to the “toxic censorship culture on college campuses.” But of course, their real mission is defending toxic rightwing speech. Its website promotes a DEI and Indoctrination Tip Line that targets woke indoctrination at freshman orientation or in classrooms. They want people to send them politically offensive “videos, pictures, handouts, or other documents. They are working with the Goldwater Institute to promote a Freedom from Indoctrination Act that would abolish Diversity, Equity and Inclusion efforts on campuses.
Speech First’s executive director, Cherise Trump, no relation to the former president, is a major rightwing propagandist who was previously Associate Director of Coalition Relations at the Heritage Foundation. She has written articles that appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The American Conservative, The Federalist, The New York Post, The Washington Examiner, Washington Times, the Epoch Times, and National Review and has also been a commentator on Fox News and Newsmax.
Speech First claims “UCF’s disciplinary measures associated with their bias response team resemble reeducation camps, forcing adult college students to sit through patronizing lectures on which types of speech the university considers acceptable. Unfortunately for the school, the Constitution does not give UCF the authority to judge the content of student speech.”
Writing for the majority of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Speech First Inc v. Cartwright, Newsom argued that the University of Central Florida policy targeting “discriminatory harassment” violated the First Amendment by chilling the speech of students who argue “abortion is immoral,” “illegal immigration is dangerous” or “affirmative action is deeply unfair.” By the Court’s same logic, students should not be punished for chanting “abortion is a right,” “American immigration policy is racist,” or “from the river to the sea.”
In other rulings, Newsom also helped block a Florida law intended to punish social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter for supposedly “discriminating against conservative thought.” The law also could potentially have blocked hate speech on their platforms, although that was not its intent. Writing for the Court’s conservative majority, argued that “with minor exceptions, the government can’t tell a private person or entity what to say or how to say it.” In another opinion, Newson defended the right of elected officials to express unpopular positions.
Newsom’s decisions open a legal “can-of-worms” for right-wingers defending their right to be offensive. By the Eleventh Circuit’s logic, students should not be punished for chanting “abortion is a right,” “American immigration policy is racist,” or at pro-Gaza demonstrations, “from the river to the sea” and faculty should be free in class, on campus, at conferences, and in the media to challenge decisions by school administrators and rightwing political dictates.
Free speech cuts both ways.
Alan Singer is a historian and teacher educator at Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York. His most recent books are Social Studies for Secondary Schools, 5th edition (Routledge, 2024) and Class-Conscious Coal Miners (SUNY Press, 2024). Blogs, tweets, essays, interviews, and e-blasts present his views and not those of Hofstra University.