First Openly Trans Army Officer Caught Trying To Pass Classified Info To Russia

First Openly Trans Army Officer Caught Trying To Pass Classified Info To Russia

In a Thursday breaking and quite bizarre story of many “firsts”, a transgender US Army officer has been charged with stealing classified medical records from Fort Bragg and seeking to hand them over to the Russian government.

A mere few years ago the officer was celebrated as the Army’s first trans Army officer, identified as 39-year old Major Jamie Lee Henry. His wife, who works at Johns Hopkins, Anna Gabrielian also has been charged as a co-conspirator. Both are “accused of using their secret security clearance at North Carolina’s Fort Bragg to steal the records from the base’s hospital,” according to the Department of Justice.

The Rockville, Maryland couple was caught red-handed in an FBI sting, after which they were formally charged with conspiracy and wrongful disclosure of individually identifiable health information. They thought they were preparing to hand off secret stolen records to a Russian official, but it turned out to be an FBI agent. 

Another strange aspect to the story is that there’s a Ukraine war angle, as CNBC explains:

Prosecutors said the couple, 39-year-old Maj. Jamie Lee Henry, and Johns Hopkins Hospital anesthesiologist Anna Gabrielian, 36, aimed to help Russia in its ongoing war against Ukraine. But the person who ended up receiving medical information from them turned out to be an undercover FBI agent, not a Russian Embassy employee as the couple had been led to believe, prosecutors said.

And the CNBC report also notes the following: “Henry in 2015 was reported to be the first known active-duty Army officer to come out as transgender. While she identifies herself as a woman, the indictment repeatedly refers to Henry by male pronouns.”

Major Jamie Lee Henry, the Army’s first trans officer, via The Daily Mail

Strangely, this transgender officer and doctor spouse say they were motived by “patriotism toward Russia”:

Gabrielian agreed to meet the agent in a Baltimore hotel room on Aug. 17, the indictment says. Later that same day, she called the agent “to reaffirm” the couple “were committed to helping Russia,” the indictment alleges.

During the meeting, Gabrielian told the FBI agent “she was motivated by patriotism toward Russia to provide any assistance she could to Russia, even if it meant being fired or going to jail,” the indictment says.

The indictment indicates they had plans to flee the country with their children: “Gabrilelian suggested a cover story for their interactions, and a plan for Gabrielian and Henry’s children flee the US quickly if Gabrielian and Henry were told to act in a way that could expose their communications and actions to the US government.”

It’s unclear precisely how the pair thought they were “helping” the Russians by handing over medical information on Army personnel, but it appears they were making themselves willing recruits as spies.

For example Gabrielian told an agent, according to the indictment that her trans husband “was currently a more important source for Russia than she was, since Henry had more helpful information, including on how the U.S. military establishes an army hospital in war conditions, and about previous training the U.S. military provided to Ukrainian military personnel.”

Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/29/2022 – 16:50

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/DaL9QfO Tyler Durden

Despite Horrific Guidance And Recession Warnings, Micron Rises Thanks To Aggressive Capex Cuts

Despite Horrific Guidance And Recession Warnings, Micron Rises Thanks To Aggressive Capex Cuts

Three months after Micron plunged following poor Q3 earnings and a dismal forecast, the company has done it again, and after the close the memory chipmaker reported revenue that missed (despite a small beat on EPS and margins), but it was the forecast that again was a total disaster.

First, a look at the just concluded fourth fiscal quarter:

  • Adjusted revenue $6.64 billion, -20% y/y, missing the estimate of $6.8 billion
  • Adjusted EPS $1.45 vs. $2.42 y/y, beating the estimate of $1.37
  • Adjusted gross margin 40.3% vs. 47.9% y/y, beating the estimate 39.7%
  • Cash flow from operations $3.78 billion, -2.8% y/y, beating the estimate $3.67 billion

But while the historical numbers may have been passable, the guidance was an absolute disaster, disappointing on the top line, the bottom line and margin.  The company now sees (press release):

  • Adjusted revenue $4 billion to $4.5 billion, far below the estimate $6.02 billion
  • Adjusted loss per share 6c to EPS 14c, far below the estimate EPS 87c
  • Adjusted gross margin 24% to 28%, far below the estimate 33.6%

It gets worse: echoing some of the biggest corporate recession warnings so far, Micron said “results were impacted by rapidly weakening consumer demand and significant customer inventory adjustments across all end markets.” It added that due to the sharp decline in near-term demand, it expects “supply growth to be above demand growth in calendar 2022.”

Which, of course, is the reverse bullwhip effect – which we discussed back in May – in its full glory.

Which brings us to the punchline: in response to the sharp economic slowdown and the weak environment, Micron is decreasing supply growth through significant cuts to FY23 CapEx.

Specifically, the company said that “we are taking decisive steps to reduce our supply growth including a nearly 50% wafer fab equipment capex cut versus last year, and we expect to emerge from this downcycle well positioned to capitalize on the long-term demand for memory and storage.”

Additionally, Micron said that it:

  • Remains on track to start the ramp of 1-beta DRAM node in manufacturing by the end of calendar 2022.
  • Expects FY23 CapEx to be around USD 8Bnn.
  • Expects strong rev growth in H2 FY23 as bit demand rebounds, following substantial improvement in customer inventories.

So even though it is going from bad to worse for the economy, and the company is slashing guidance as if it is headed into a recession, if not depression, the stock managed a solid rebound after markets learned about the company’s aggressive cost-cutting strategy as Micron hunkers down and hopes to hibernate the coming economic winter with as little damage as possible.

 

 

 

 

Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/29/2022 – 16:40

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/mPxjFqv Tyler Durden

Italy’s Return to Fascism?


Image of Giorgia Meloni overlaid on Italian flag

Reason’s Zach Weissmueller and Nick Gillespie spoke with Jonah Goldberg of The Dispatch about the recent election in Italy, which saw the ascendance of the Brothers of Italy party to power as the governing majority and likely paves to way for Italy’s first female prime minister, Giorgia Meloni. 

The reaction has been swift and severe. Some commentators have characterized this as the return of fascism to Italy, pointing to past associations and political imagery as evidence that neo-fascists are now in charge. On the other hand, some American conservatives have said the rhetoric is over the top and that the Left is just throwing around the term fascist to discredit a political movement they don’t like. 

Goldberg published a best-seller on this very topic called Liberal Fascism in 2008 and become known as a persistent critic of the brand of right-wing populism that Trump brought into the Republican Party and which is taking hold in many places in Europe such as Italy, Hungary and Sweden.

Watch the full discussion above.

The post Italy's Return to Fascism? appeared first on Reason.com.

from Latest https://ift.tt/9nMDLlz
via IFTTT

The AFA, FIRE, and AAUP on Idaho’s Abortion-Related Speech Restrictions

The general counsel of the University of Idaho issued a guidance memo to university employees regarding the implications of the state’s new abortion law for university operations. That memo told professors that they should maintain instructional neutrality in any classroom discussions relating to abortion if they wished to avoid the possibility of criminal prosecution. I wrote about the law and the memo in an earlier post. Eugene Volokh has likewise blogged about it.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression and the Academic Freedom Alliance and the American Association of University Professors have now issued separate letters regarding the assault on academic freedom in Idaho. The FIRE letter can be found hereThe AAUP statement can be found here. The AFA letter can be found here.

From the AFA letter:

It is imperative that the University of Idaho not merely inform the faculty of the potential risks of teaching with such a law on the books but also strongly voice its objections to any such interpretation or application of the state law. The general counsel’s guidance sends a chilling message to every member of the faculty who must discuss difficult and controversial material relating to abortion as part of their teaching duties. The statute itself might not recognize “academic freedom [as] a defense to violation of law,” but the First Amendment is an overriding limitation on the power of the state legislature to impose such a restriction on classroom teaching in state universities.

The post The AFA, FIRE, and AAUP on Idaho's Abortion-Related Speech Restrictions appeared first on Reason.com.

from Latest https://ift.tt/RsBg8kV
via IFTTT

Zoning Laws Make Child Care Unaffordable in Utah


Pre-school children playing with their teacher on the floor

Utahns fork over half a paycheck (or more) for child care, while child care workers struggle with low pay. And costly zoning laws are to blame.

Utah has a child care shortage, with long waitlists for parents trying to get babies and toddlers into centers. According to Susan Madsen, a Utah State University leadership professor who testified to the state’s Economic Development and Workforce Services Interim Committee last year, over 150,000 children in Utah under 6 possibly need child care, but only 63,000 slots are available in formal child care programs or other state-licensed ones.

In that same hearing, Johnny Anderson, a former state lawmaker and the president and CEO of ABC Great Beginnings child care centers, told the committee that growing areas in the state don’t have an adequate amount of child care facilities. 

But building them can be a nightmare. During a May 2021 hearing at the state Capitol, child care center owners told lawmakers about the many obstacles certain zoning practices create for them. Many of those laws add hundreds of thousands of dollars to a project before a center even opens, keeping would-be center owners from entering the child care market and keeping costs high for families.

“You gotta spend money not only on the property, you gotta spend money on engineering, architecture to get something that you can finally get in front of a city staff to get approval to move to the next stage, which is often a planning commission,” Anderson said last year. “You’re going to get an up-or-down vote from them or recommendations of things that you gotta change before you can finally get over to a city council.”

Anderson recalled that after finding a property in a master-planned community that had the zoning for a child care center, he still had to go through a frustrating rezoning process.

“It takes four months to get in front of a city council just for the rezone. And as I’m sitting in that city council meeting, the city council members start arguing amongst themselves whether or not the zone that they had identified on a master plan was really the zone that they want in that space.” The city attorney ultimately asked Anderson to go through the rezoning process again.

Anderson believes local officials have no idea what these delays and denials cost. “I said, ‘I am paying $13,000 a month in interest on this piece of ground. And you act as though it’s nothing for me to go back and start this process over.'”

In addition, he had to bury power lines and install a new sidewalk. Then the city changed its water detention standards before he got his building permit. “All of this resulted in about $400,000 above what the construction costs were going to be for this facility,” Anderson said. Not many child care center owners have an extra $400,000 lying around.

Staffing child care facilities is another hurdle. Anderson said that while child care centers in Utah spend about $0.50 on staffing for every dollar in revenue, “We have to figure out a way to get more money to our staff.” Not forcing centers to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to meet unnecessary zoning requirements could help.

An easy zoning fix would be to give child care centers the same development flexibility as charter schools. “Charter schools are basically treated like public schools, which are basically treated like state facilities,” said Anderson. “Where, as long as you are [sticking to a] uniform building code, cities really can’t get in your way.”

Both Republicans and Democrats in the Utah Legislature tell Reason that they have not decided what child care bills, if any, they will run next session. However, they also pointed to recent bills that reduced regulations and expanded access to child care. Lawmakers consistently get pushback from cities that don’t want the state butting into local zoning decisions, no matter how unreasonable those rules are. And the powerful Utah League of Cities and Towns, a nonpartisan cooperative of localities, is also known to fight state laws targeting local zoning.

But the major problems won’t be solved if petty city tyrants are allowed to jerk around small business owners. And Utahns will continue paying the price for the state’s child care shortage as potential owners face many setbacks in opening new centers. As Anderson said, “The new people…who want to take that risk cannot do this.”

The post Zoning Laws Make Child Care Unaffordable in Utah appeared first on Reason.com.

from Latest https://ift.tt/qCloBUe
via IFTTT

The Can Has Reached The End Of The Road

The Can Has Reached The End Of The Road

Authored by Omid Malekan,

Markets are like children. They can only learn the most important lessons the hard way, by making mistakes and suffering the consequences.

One of my earliest memories is of a visit to a local park with my father and my sister. This park had a big fountain full of fish and my sister climbed up to get a closer look while my dad repeatedly warned her to be careful. She didn’t listen and fell in, so dad had to pull her out. The water was cold and she was shivering.

Years later, my father told us that he intentionally fought the urge to grab her before she fell, even though he was certain that she would. He wanted her to learn an important lesson about listening to her parents, and being careful around water. He even let her stay in the cold water a beat longer to make sure the lesson stuck.

I share this story as an allegory of the right way to manage an economy and a financial system. Good policymakers know that economic agents (of any age) are like children. If you prevent them from suffering the consequences of their own decisions — however painful those consequences might be — then they will never learn. Investors, bankers, and borrowers are always probing the boundaries of what they can get away with. Bail them out from stupid risk taking and they will get stupider.

We’ve all met kids who are never punished by their parents or allowed to fail. They grow up to be miserable adults, stumbling from one fiasco to another and eventually spiraling out of control. That’s the state of the global financial system today.

For decades, central bankers and other government officials have been bailing out market participants from the consequences of their own folly. The 1987 crash, Long Term Capital, the 2008 financial crisis, the European debt crisis, and countless other macroeconomic events that should have resulted in major players being punished for making bad decisions did not. Instead, rates were cut, money was printed, stimulus was introduced, and the kids who ignored the warnings of their parents were not allowed to fall. They were given stern warnings after the fact, but kids who didn’t get wet don’t listen.

All of this was done under the guise of protecting ordinary people. Let Wall Street fail, government officials told us, and Main Street would suffer. This was always a dubious claim, but some version of it was embraced by both sides of the political spctrum in almost every country, and the financial system grew ever more fragile.

Then came COVID, and any pretense of discipline went out the window. Bailing out bad actors was now a virtue, no matter how little they deserved it. So the Federal Reserve backstopped the junk bond market then gave a speech about protecting healthcare workers. The most egregious interventions were eventually wound down, but the precedence had been set: the closer the kids got to the edge, the more the government would try to save them. An importat opportunity for a market reset was lost, and the can was kicked further down the road.

All that stimulus — the size and variety of which was unprecedented in modern history — resulted in record inflation. Unlike the prior interventions, whose negative consequences were felt in more implicit ways such as economic inequality, the negative consequences of this affair are front page news. People hate inflation so governments have no choice but to respond, undoing decades of easy money and raising interest rates. Markets are not taking it well. Currencies are plunging, borrowing costs are soaring and the global economy is starting to teeter.

Policy makers are now stuck in a bind. Do nothing and inflation will rage, or do something and important markets may break. The proverbial can has reached the end of the road.

What happened in the UK this week — a collapsing bond market that forced the Bank of England to reverse itself — is only the beginning. You can’t abruptly cut off a kid you’ve been spoiling for years without causing a tantrum. That’s not how people work, and it’s certainly not how markets work. A global economy built on cheap money is about to be tested in unprecedented fashion.

How many public companies who loaded up on cheap debt to finance share buybacks will now have to reverse the process? How many governments who run major deficits will be able to tighten their belts as borrowing costs rise? How many centrist governments will survive simultaneously surging food, fuel and borrowing costs? How many real estate deals will remain viable when mortgage rates approach 8%? Which hedge fund is about to blow up?

Only time will tell, and you’ll have to protect yourself.

How?

As it turns out, there’s one financial system that has never had a bailout, market intervention or outside stimulus. You’ll know it from its extreme volatility, and the fact that its biggest players can and do fail. In this system, the depositors who trust bad banks lose their savings and the traders who used too much leverage lose everything.

The stewards of the old system love to criticize this one, in part because lots of people can and do get wet on a regular basis, some of them undeservedly so. But in a year when the old system keeps teetering on the edge, this one has already had its baptism by fire, making it antifragile and far more trustworthy.

Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/29/2022 – 16:20

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/HL9YcNy Tyler Durden

The Crash Just Won’t Stop But Today Something Changed

The Crash Just Won’t Stop But Today Something Changed

After yesterday’s euphoric, BOE-inspired, short-squeezed meltup, today was supposed to be a continuation rally courtesy of one of the most oversold markets in history.

It didn’t quite work out that way, and stocks opened into an absolute rout, with the NYSE TICK indicator not turning positive until almost one hour into trading after one of the biggest negative ticks of 2022.

As a result, those who expected yesterday’s BOE “temporary QE” pivot would be enough to push stocks higher for at least a few more days – here even some of the biggest pessimists expected this bear market rally to last for 2-3 days at least – were promptly disappointed as stocks tumbled all day, dropping almost to new 2022 lows…

…. in a broad, and high-volume selloff which dragged every sector lower.

The selling which for all intents and purposes pushed stocks to 2022 lows (and the lowest since Nov 2020), meant that spoos are now down 7 of the past 8 days, with today’s drop more than wiping out all of yesterday’s gains.

But unlike recent selloffs which were mostly catalyzed by surging yields, or a soaring dollar, today we have seen neither, as both 10Y TSY yields (as 30Y gilts have gone nowhere)…

… and the Bloomberg dollar index slumped all day in what would otherwise have been a huge relief for risk assets.

One possible reason for the continued USD weakness: after a modest attempt to rebound, Nov Fed hike odds slumped again, and after pricing in nearly 90% odds of a 75bps in Nov, the odds are back to just 63% and dropping.

But while oil did indeed enjoy the slide in the dollar, avoiding an even bigger rout thanks to a Reuters report that OPEC+ would cut output by 500K-1MMb/d next week…

… the same can not be said for US stocks obviously, as instead of macro traders today were focused on the micro, with Apple tumbling for a second day in a row, and one of its biggest slides in the past year…

… this time following a rare downgrade from BofA.

The continued implosion in AAPL and other tech names has pushed Goldman’s most-shorted tech index to March 2020 levels, and is about to take out that particular support, bringing the index back to Dec 2018 levels.

Additionally, the absolute disintegration in used car retailer, Karmax, which lost a quarter of its market cap today following catastrophic earnings and a dire assessment of the industry, certainly did not help the apocalyptic investor sentiment.

In any case, whatever prompted today’s sell off – and as Goldman explained there is much more selling to come – one thing is certain: stocks can keep crashing 10% every day in perpetuity and thanks to Zeno’s paradox, they still won’t hit bottom.

Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/29/2022 – 16:05

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/1lWjQ7c Tyler Durden

“We’re Horrified”: Major Brands Pull Twitter Ad Campaigns Over Child Porn

“We’re Horrified”: Major Brands Pull Twitter Ad Campaigns Over Child Porn

When it comes to policing mean tweets – or any opinion to the right of Mao, Twitter’s army of pink-haired social justice censors is on it.

But when it comes to pedophiles, the social media giant’s censorship is so lax that major advertisers – including Dyson, Mazda, Forbes and PBS Kids – have suspended their marketing campaigns or removed ads from ‘parts of Twitter’ because their promotions were featured next to tweets soliciting child pornography, Reuters reports.

DIRECTV and Thoughtworks also told Reuters late on Wednesday they have paused their advertising on Twitter.

Brands ranging from Walt Disney Co, NBCUniversal and Coca-Cola Co to a children’s hospital were among more than 30 advertisers that appeared on the profile pages of Twitter accounts peddling links to the exploitative material, according to a Reuters review of accounts identified in new research about child sex abuse online from cybersecurity group Ghost Data. -Reuters

Easily filtered keywords including “rape” and “teens” were featured alongside promoted tweets from corporate advertisers, a Reuters review found.

In one case, a Cole Haan ad appeared next to a tweet in which a user solicited “trading teen/child” content.

We’re horrified,” said Cole Haan brand president, David Maddocks. “Either Twitter is going to fix this, or we’ll fix it by any means we can, which includes not buying Twitter ads.”

In another example, a user tweeted searching for content of “Yung girls ONLY, NO Boys,” which was immediately followed by a promoted tweet for Texas-based Scottish Rite Children’s Hospital. Scottish Rite did not return multiple requests for comment. -Reuters

Twitter offered a boilerplate response, telling Reuters that the company “has zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation,” and is investing more resources dedicated to child safety, adding that the company is working closely with advertisers and partners to investigate and avoid embarrassing corporate clients in the future.

Twitter’s child porn issues were noted by The Verge in late August, causing pushback from advertisers that are critical to the company’s revenue stream.

After Reuters presented Twitter with a sample of 20 accounts promoting child porn last Thursday, the company removed around 300 additional accounts from the network, but over 100 remained on the platform the following day, according to Ghost Data and Reuters.

Then on Monday, Reuters shared a full list of more than 500 accounts furnished by Ghost Data, which Twitter reviewed before permanently suspending them.

Twitter scrambled to do damage control Wednesday morning ahead of the Reuters story, telling advertisers in an email that it had “discovered that ads were running within Profiles that were involved with publicly selling or soliciting child sexual abuse material.”

“Twitter needs to fix this problem ASAP, and until they do, we are going to cease any further paid activity on Twitter,” said a Forbes spokesperson.

Mazda, meanwhile, said “There is no place for this type of content online,” adding that the company is now prohibiting ads from appearing on Twitter profile pages.

A Disney spokesperson called the content “reprehensible” and said they are “doubling-down on our efforts to ensure that the digital platforms on which we advertise, and the media buyers we use, strengthen their efforts to prevent such errors from recurring.”

A spokesperson for Coca-Cola, which had a promoted tweet appear on an account tracked by the researchers, said it did not condone the material being associated with its brand and said “any breach of these standards is unacceptable and taken very seriously.”

NBCUniversal said it has asked Twitter to remove the ads associated with the inappropriate content. -Reuters

When will Elon Musk enter the Reuters story into evidence?

Tyler Durden
Thu, 09/29/2022 – 15:45

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/bLGYaME Tyler Durden

The University of Idaho Tries To Force Faculty To Remain ‘Neutral’ on Abortion


University of Idaho

At the University of Idaho, administrators can pass out condoms to prevent the spread of STDs but not to prevent pregnancy. Why? The University has adopted an extreme set of policies as part of an overzealous attempt to comply with an Idaho state bill banning the use of public funds for abortion—violating faculty free speech rights in the process.

Last week, the University of Idaho’s General Counsel released a policy aimed at directing faculty and staff behavior following the enforcement of Idaho’s “No Public Funds for Abortion Act.” However, the policy appears to go beyond the requirements of Idaho law, instead banning faculty and staff from expressing opinions on the subject of abortion. The university’s policy not only is unconstitutional but also shows how free speech is often on the chopping block when vague laws and nervous administrators collide.

In 2021, the Idaho Legislature passed a bill prohibiting the use of public funds to “provide, perform, or induce an abortion; assist in the provision or performance of an abortion; promote abortion; counsel in favor of abortion; refer for abortion; or provide facilities for an abortion or for training to provide or perform an abortion.” The law also bans public university tuition and fees from being used for these purposes. Further, public university–run health clinics and university employees are also prohibited from providing emergency contraception, except in the case of rape, in addition to other limits on their conduct.

The law is vague, and it is unclear whether the bill would pass First Amendment muster. Whether the law is constitutional would primarily depend on an interpretation of the word “promote.” As Eugene Volokh wrote in The Volokh Conspiracy this week, “In this sort of context, it seems to me, ‘promote’ does not refer to abstract advocacy, such as the statement ‘I believe that abortion should be legal’ or even ‘I encourage you to obtain an abortion.’ It refers to the recommendation to a particular person to get an abortion.”

In that case, banning the “promotion” of abortion is likely compliant with the First Amendment. As Volokh argues, the act of “promoting” abortion, applied to mean specifically urging someone to obtain an abortion “would probably also be constitutionally unprotected [speech], at least if it’s urging an abortion in Idaho, since that would be solicitation of a crime.”

However, the University of Idaho appears to interpret “promotion” to include any action that appears to show a favorable opinion of abortion. In doing so, the school has banned expression clearly protected by the First Amendment—which, as a public institution, it is directly prohibited from doing.

The University of Idaho’s policy goes beyond what is explicitly banned in law. In addition to banning employees from promoting abortion, counseling in favor of it, providing referrals for abortion, or contracting with abortion providers, the university’s policy curtails faculty speech in typical classroom discussions.

“Classroom discussion of [abortion] should be approached carefully. While academic freedom supports classroom discussions of topics related to abortion, these should be limited to discussions and topics relevant to the class subject,” wrote the university’s General Counsel. “Academic freedom is not a defense to violation of law, and faculty or others in charge of classroom topics and discussion must themselves remain neutral on the topic and cannot conduct or engage in discussions in violation of these prohibitions without risking prosecution.”

The university’s “neutrality” mandate also applies to classroom discussions of contraception. The university justifies this by invoking an existing Idaho law that prohibits anyone who isn’t a doctor or medical professional acting under a doctor’s orders from distributing or advertising contraceptives. The university defends its interpretation of the law—an interpretation that also led the school to allow university employees to provide condoms to students to prevent the spread of STDs but not for pregnancy prevention—by arguing that relevant state law is “unclear and untested in the courts. Since violation is considered a felony, we are advising a conservative approach here, that the university not provide standard birth control itself.”

Such a restriction on academic freedom clearly violates the First Amendment. “No statute can authorize a public university to censor pedagogically relevant classroom discussion,” said Adam Steinbaugh, an attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, in a press release about the policy. “Speech about abortion—legal or not—cannot be limited based on its viewpoint.”

The University of Idaho is clearly afraid of scrutiny from overzealous prosecutors. However, fear does not justify silencing academic freedom. “U of I’s sweeping policy directly contravenes the university’s legal obligations and impermissibly chills in-class speech by placing faculty in perpetual fear of punishment for their protected expression,” wrote Graham Piro, a program officer at FIRE, in a letter addressing the university. “It does not take a significant stretch of the imagination to see how the university’s guidance will adversely impact classroom instruction. For example, a political science professor publishing a public policy argument that abortion should be lawful will have to self-censor to ensure the discussion is not perceived as being ‘in favor of abortion.'”

The University of Idaho’s actions show what can happen when nervous university lawyers are put in charge of interpreting vague state laws. Ultimately, when a university places its desire to avoid controversy over protecting academic freedom, First Amendment rights are often the first to go.

The post The University of Idaho Tries To Force Faculty To Remain 'Neutral' on Abortion appeared first on Reason.com.

from Latest https://ift.tt/ACYn2I6
via IFTTT

“You’re Nobody” and the Law: Removing Candidate’s Ballotpedia Page Isn’t Libelous

From Magistrate Judge Phillip Green’s Report & Recommendation Tuesday in Trouten v. Ballotpedia (W.D. Mich.):

Plaintiff alleges that Ballotpedia “has withdrew the ‘Bryan Trouten for United States House of Representatives Campaign’ on their website.” Plaintiff alleges that this action constitutes libel and/or defamation under state law. Plaintiff seeks $5,000,000.00 in damages….

It must first be noted that Plaintiff does not allege that Defendant made any false or defamatory statement concerning him. Instead, Plaintiff alleges that Defendant merely removed information from its website concerning him. Defendant argues that Plaintiff’s claim fails the first element. But Plaintiff further alleges that, by removing the information in question from its website, Defendant was falsely “claiming that [Plaintiff] withdrew his campaign.” Thus, Plaintiff asserts that Defendant’s actions implied, falsely, that Plaintiff had withdrawn his campaign.

Michigan recognizes a cause of action for defamation by implication. To prevail on such a claim, Plaintiff must establish that the defamatory implication is “materially false.” Plaintiff alleges that he did not withdraw his candidacy for the U.S. House of Representatives and, moreover, that he timely submitted with the State of Michigan the paperwork necessary to be considered a write-in candidate. Thus, contrary to Defendant’s arguments, Plaintiff’s allegations satisfy the initial element of the analysis.

{Defendant asserts that it merely “listed [Plaintiff] as an inactive candidate after the Michigan Department of State released an official candidate list without [Plaintiff’s] name on it.”  Defendant further asserts that “[w]hen Trouten informed Ballotpedia that he was an active write-in candidate, Ballotpedia updated its encyclopedia to reflect that status.” These assertions are not supported by any evidence and go beyond the scope of a motion asserted under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). The Court has, therefore, disregarded the assertions in question. If Defendant wanted to present evidence and argue that it is entitled to relief as a matter of law, it should have asserted a motion [for summary judgment] under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56.}

Plaintiff’s claim nevertheless fails because the implication that Plaintiff withdrew his candidacy for the U.S. House of Representatives is simply not defamatory because it does not tend to harm Plaintiff’s reputation or deter third persons from associating with Plaintiff. See, e.g., Kevorkian v. American Medical Association (Mich. Ct. App. 1999) (the court “may determine, as a matter of law, whether a statement is actually capable of defamatory meaning”).

Plaintiff’s claim fails for a second reason as well. Because Plaintiff was a candidate for public office, he is considered, for present purposes, a public figure. As such, Plaintiff must establish that Defendant acted with “actual malice” or “with knowledge that [its implied statement] was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” Plaintiff has failed to allege any facts which, if proven, would satisfy this standard. Thus, Plaintiff’s claim fails, in the alternative, for this reason.

In his response to the present motion, Plaintiff fails to present any argument, or identify any authority, in opposition to Defendant’s motion. Rather, Plaintiff merely states, “I didn’t want to[o] much information about my case being exposed to the defense, because I actually have material facts as well as many other factual evidence that are deemed troublesome to this case.” This vague, unsworn statement fails to advance Plaintiff’s position. Plaintiff further states, “I want to end with this” and requests that he be permitted to “express [his] side of the case in person” because “[i]t will definitely provide the material needed in understanding the case a little better….” The Court appreciates Plaintiff’s desire to be heard, but Plaintiff has presented no argument or authority suggesting that oral argument would assist the Court in determining the legal sufficiency of the allegations in Plaintiff’s complaint….

Congratulations to Joseph E. Richotte, Jennifer A. Dukarski & Barrett R.H. Young of Butzel Long, P.C., who represent Ballotpedia.

The post "You're Nobody" and the Law: Removing Candidate's Ballotpedia Page Isn't Libelous appeared first on Reason.com.

from Latest https://ift.tt/BcEdZOg
via IFTTT