One reason I'm a fierce defender of free speech is that I, the daughter of a Palestinian, grew up witnessing the silencing of criticism of Israel through false allegations of anti-semitism. 1/ I've remained silent for far too long b/c I, too, am terrified of being the recipient of such charges. I'm afraid of losing my job, harming my professional reputation, losing friends, and incurring wrath on this platform. But I have had enough. 2/

In 2022, California passed AB 2098, which punished drs for giving patients advice about Covid that bucks "scientific consensus," whatever that means. We (@NCLAlegal) sued on behalf of 5 doctors, including @TracyBethHoeg, @AaronKheriatyMD, @PeterMazolewski & @AzadehKhatibi 1/ On Jan. 25, 2023, we obtained a preliminary injunction in the Eastern District of California. The judge found that the law violated Plaintiffs' due process rights b/c it was unconstitutionally vague. After defendants faced a skeptical panel in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals 2/

A few words about today's argument in the Supreme Court in Murthy v. Missouri. Merely invoking the concept of "safety" does not justify government censorship. The last four years could not have illustrated that more clearly: eminent scientists were censored in the domains 1/ of their expertise, often at the behest of the government, resulting in public debate about covid policies being smothered. Just today, the New York Times admitted school closures were pointless and harmful. 2/

This article is so outrageous it warrants a 2nd thread. According to Politico, the Biden Admin claims that our lawsuit against the gov't for involvement in online censorship is a cause of rising anti-vaxx sentiment. This contention is specious at best 1/politico.com/news/2023/09/2… First, the injunction against the Biden Admin was not issued until July 4, and it has mostly been stayed pending further proceedings since then. At arguments and in briefing, the government has admitted that it continues to engage in the conduct we're challenging-- 2/

This article is so outrageous it warrants a thread; apologies for the rant. Summary of article: Biden admin and various "public health" officials blame the rise of the anti-vaxx movement on online mis/disinfo. This almost willful ignorance is stunning 1/politico.com/news/2023/09/2… I will speak only for myself here, though I know I'm not alone. Before early 2021, I had never considered NOT getting a vaccine. I certainly assumed if I had children, I would give them every vaccine recommended by their doctors. 2/

The Fifth Circuit just issued an excellent decision saying that the FDA acted outside of its delegated authority when it tweeted that people shouldn't take ivermectin. The decision is available below, & is applicable in censorship & vaxx mandate cases 1/
drive.google.com/file/d/1vbZ_Qn… The court recognized that government actors don't have unlimited free speech rights. This is the government's defense in Mo. v. Biden--that government officials/employees have a 1A right to express their opinions to social media companies. No. 2/

No, it’s not “immoral,” to want to have biological children. It is literally what we’re wired for biologically. The radical left has become fundamentally anti- human. We’re supposed to deny our most basic, biological urges to socialize, procreate 1/ wired.com/story/ethics-c… even the observable realities of biological sex in some quest for a robotic, antihuman utopia. 2/2

303 Creative is not a blow to LGBTQ rights, as the MSM is portraying it. Nor is it the gateway to segregation or discrimination against minorities. It ultimately holds that government can’t force individuals to endorse ideas or utter speech that violates their consciences 1/ This is a position liberals should be on board with. To quote the opinion itself: “the First Amendment envisions the United States as a rich and complex place where all persons are free to think as they wish and not as the government demands.” 2/

So the covidian narrative is that the lockdowns saved lives even though 1.2 million people died and/or anyway there were no real lockdowns, you just maybe couldn’t go to the gym for a couple months, and civil liberties are a silly right wing concept. Exhibit 1

It’s incredibly disturbing to me that the public has moved on from the covid era without any acknowledgment of just how egregious the civil liberties violations were; how damaging the restrictions were to children, the poor and working class, the elderly, the mentally ill 1/ those who live alone, and those who have substance abuse problems; and the utter pointlessness of the suffering power hungry bureaucrats inflicted on us. But then I realized: maybe such reckonings don’t occur for a generation or so. 2/

In a scathing statement, Justice Gorsuch described covid restrictions as possibly "the greatest intrusion[] on civil liberties in the peacetime history of this country." He recognized that gov't "pressured social-media companies to suppress information about pandemic policies.. with which they disagreed." @DrJBhattacharya @MartinKulldorff @MarkChangizi @danielkotzin @michaelpsenger @akheriaty @HealthFreedomLA

Something has gone terribly wrong in science and medicine. realityslaststand.com/p/were-not-goi…
The author of this piece astutely observes that "Lawmakers shouldn’t have to restrict sex changes to adults, but US-based medical organizations are not doing their job at following the science" 1/ The other day, the Atlantic published an article about a doctor who provides late-term abortions, often on healthy babies. I had been under the--I now realize false impression--that doctors just wouldn't do this because medical ethics wouldn't allow it. 2/

I was a huge fan of DeSantis throughout covid. But I cannot abide by the fact he is signing into law bills that obviously violate the First Amendment. That's so although I don't agree with much of the speech these laws target, b/c that's what it means to believe in free speech. DeSantis could find ways to oppose the woke agenda without violating Floridians' free speech rights.

Judge Doughty just DENIED gov't defendants' motion to dismiss in Missouri v. Biden (with an exception for claims against President, which are generally disfavored). I'm working my way through the 77-page decision, which I'll link to soon and post choice quotes from nclalegal.org/state-of-misso… Here's the decision and order

The blitz of articles from left-leaning media and Tweeters condemning the Cochrane review of efficacy of mask mandates is nothing short of astonishing. Because the authors acknowledged that subjects didn't always wear facecoverings properly, mask fanatics insist this shows 1/5 the problem is with people, not masks or mandates. Setting aside that masks probably don't stop the spread of respiratory viruses even if worn properly because the aerosols are too small, it should go without saying that the reason people were "noncomplaint" is that it 2/5

I haven't been tweeting as much as I arguably ought to be about recent admissions the lockdown/mandate skeptics had it right. Part of it is because I don't know what to say. It's incredibly frustrating that I --and many of you--said these things for three years 1/ Yet we were treated with contempt, demonized, and depicted as right-wing lunatics. Like many of you, I lost friends and even family members. Far from any acknowledgment that we had foresight others did not--including the geniuses at the NY Times and CDC--this is all being 2/

Rochelle Walensky: "our masking guidance doesn't really change with time." She also essentially stated that it doesn't change with the evidence, either. This is just anti-science and about billionth nail in the coffin of CDC's credibility

https://twitter.com/MichaelPSenger/status/1625643023882403840

her arguments are (1) the Cochrane review only included randomized controlled studies.
How is that a negative? Perhaps we should be relying on stories about barbershops in Missouri for our science instead?

Yesterday, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals heard argument in the federal mask mandate case. If you care about this issue, I urge you to read the following from my older and wiser colleague who almost always predicts accurately. It contains some good and bad news: 1) the court is likely going to find that the mandate was issued in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act, because notice and comment was not followed. Probably, the court will not touch the larger question of whether CDC has the authority to issue such a mandate

I'm going to tell the story of Brianne Dressen, a courageous woman who participated in Covid-19 vaccine trials, was severely injured, and found solace in online support groups. Soon after, Facebook & other platforms began shutting the groups down--at the government's behest. 1/ Brianne was a 40-year-old preschool teacher and mother of two children. In November of 2020, she received the first of two doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine as part of a clinical trial she had volunteered to participate in. 2/

wsj.com/articles/unite…
Just days after @akheriaty and I published a piece in @WSJopinion documenting @POTUS's abuse of power via the emails of his director of digital strategy @RFlaherty46, providing clear evidence the Administration violated your First Amendment rights 1/ the President has the audacity to write an oped blaming the tech companies for all that is bad in the world and calling on Congress to "hold them accountable." It's not the tech companies' abuses that are the constitutional concern. It's yours, Mr. President. 2/2

Most Americans today do not understand that guarding constitutional rights and civil liberties comes at a cost. That cost is that it's boring--you have to educate yourself and spend time thinking about things and ideally understanding some history and the Constitution. 1/6 (Regurgitating MSNBC doesn't count). Too many people I know find that cost too high, since they want to spend all of their free time watching sports or reality TV (and nothing wrong with doing those things in moderation--I also have guilty pleasures). 2/6