THURSDAY, JUNE 4 | 1:30 PM EDT
A Supreme Court term that saw historic firsts—oral argument by telephone and live audio—is drawing to a close. Terms usually end with a bang, and this bang will be louder than most because so many important cases remain undecided. Our panel of Supreme Court experts will discuss the Court's impending decisions and the issues on the line, including (to name just a few): What restrictions on abortion are permissible? Do federal discrimination laws apply to gender identity and sexual orientation? Can educational tax credits go to religious schools? And can New York and the U.S. House of Representatives get their hands on President Trump's financial records?

SPEAKERS:
John Malcolm
Vice President, Institute for Constitutional Government
The Heritage Foundation
Amy Howe
Co-Founder and Reporter 
SCOTUSblog
John Eastman
Henry Salvatori Professor of Law & Community Service 
Chapman University's Fowler School of Law
Moderated by Committee for Justice President Curt Levey.
ICYMI: Last Week
It is unfortunate that most of the attacks on the executive order fail to acknowledge the legitimate concerns motivating the order, namely that content moderation policies on certain social media platforms have a disparate impact on conservative expression and sometimes result in outright anti-conservative bias. Twitter's decision to single President Trump out for fact-checking appears to be an example of the latter.
 
That said, while we are sympathetic to these concerns and the executive order's 'commitment to free and open debate on the internet,' the order's solution – government regulation of private companies' content moderation policies – is a greater threat than the problem it seeks to address. People on both sides of the aisle should worry about putting the government in charge of policing speech. And conservatives should be particularly worried about giving more power to the federal bureaucracy, unleashing unscrupulous plaintiff's attorneys by weakening the protection of Section 230, saddling small internet startups with lawsuits and new regulations, and empowering the same activist state attorneys general who have brought us tobacco and climate change litigation.
 
The Administration cannot order the FCC and FTC, both independent agencies, to take any actions. While the executive order's more limited approach – petitioning the FCC for rulemaking and directing the FCC to 'consider taking action, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law' – is permissible, the FCC rules and FTC enforcement actions that result may be unlawful. Depending on the details, they may well violate the First Amendment rights of social media platforms or interpret Section 230 in a manner inconsistent with the statutory text, its intent, and its interpretation by the courts. [ Read Online ]

SPEAKERS:

Andrew Kingman
General Counsel at State Privacy & Security Coalition, Senior Managing Attorney at DLA Piper

Pam Dixon
Founder and Executive Director, World Privacy Forum

Roslyn Layton
Visiting Fellow, American Enterprise Institute

Ashley Baker (moderator)
Director of Public Policy, Committee for Justice
Recent Event Videos
Featuring:
Carrie Severino
Erik Jaffe
Ralph Rossum
Curt Levey (moderator)
Featuring:
Hon. Maureen K. Ohlhausen
Hon. Joshua D. Wright
Geoffrey A. Manne
Ashley Baker (moderator)
Featuring:
James Bopp, Jr.
Catherine Engelbrecht
Jason Snead
Ashley Baker (moderator)
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