The meat of this action is aimed at Israeli boycott movements on college campuses across the U.S. It threatens to withhold federal funding from schools where students organize events linked to the Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions (BDS) movement for Palestinian rights.
First Amendment
Florida House Revives Controversial College Survey That Would Undermine Intellectual Freedom
During the final hours of the 2019 legislative session, Senate Appropriations Chairman Rob Bradley, R-Fleming Island, warned senators the so-called intellectual freedom survey would “keep coming up again” and urged the Senate to block it from passing every time.
Amicus Curiae: The 16-Year-Old FPC Girl Was Racist. She Was Stupid. She Was Not Criminal.
In the case of an FPC girl who wrote bigoted threats about her teacher last December, the prosecution is making outlandish claims that it was act of terrorism, stretching the meaning of a 2018 law passed after the Parkland massacre. The law does not apply, as even the prosecution acknowledged the case’s weaknesses.
250 Journalists Imprisoned Globally in 2019, Including Spike of 30 on ‘Fake News’ Allegations
The number of journalists imprisoned for their reporting globally reached at least 250 for the fourth consecutive year, with China and Turkey topping the list of the world’s leading jailers, the Committee to Protect Journalists found.
Flagler Students’ and Faculty’s ‘Football Sunday’ at Palm Coast Church Termed ‘Serious Constitutional Violation’
“Football Sunday” at Palm Coast’s United Methodist Church has annually invited students, coaches and faculty from FPC and Matanzas, among others, in religious services, drawing a rebuke from the Freedom from Religion Foundation on constitutional grounds.
School Board Rules Out Prayers at Meetings, Ending Controversy Started by August ‘Invocation’
School Board members Colleen Conklin and Andy Dance argued against the “circus” and divisiveness that would be invited if the board abandoned its custom of the last four decades and resumed opening meetings with prayers, ending a controversy began in August when Board Chairman Janet McDonald unexpectedly invited a pastor to offer an invocation.
Lawsuit Over Banned Use of Loudspeaker for Christian Prayer Before School’s Game Is Back On
A federal appeals court Wednesday overturned the dismissal of a lawsuit about whether the Florida High School Athletic Association improperly prevented Christian schools from offering a prayer over the stadium loudspeaker before a 2015 state championship football game.
Flagler Is No Citrus: Local Officials Say New York Times Is Safe From ‘Fake News’ Censorship at Library
In the wake of Citrus County commissioners rejecting a public library digital subscription to The New York Times, Flagler County’s library and government officials stressed that nothing like that would be tolerated locally.
China Plays the NBA
The obvious prioritization of commercial ties with a government that’s attacking demonstrators in Hong Kong and putting millions of ethnic Uyghurs in concentration camps is a damning statement about what the league — and the economic system it operates in — truly values.
Rabbi Shapiro Makes Legal Case Against Flagler School Board Reviving Invocations at Meetings
Palm Coast’s Merrill Shapiro, a member of the national board of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, presented legal arguments at a talk Thursday against the Flagler County School Board’s potential return to starting meetings with invocations.