Freedom of Speech and Association

National Park Service unlawfully targeted demonstration signs that call attention to alleged sexual misconduct by President Trump.

2025 has brought one emergency after another. But in this crisis, residents across D.C. fought for their rights and showed why the urgency of self-governance in D.C. is more important than ever.

Complaint details how the man was tightly handcuffed and prevented from exercising his First Amendment rights 

The Department of Homeland Security has ordered multiple Internet Service Providers and social media companies to disclose sensitive information about users who criticized DHS’s practices. DHS has issued these demands through administrative summonses or subpoenas, which require approval only by DHS itself and not a neutral judge. This case challenges another instance of this disturbing trend. Plaintiff John Doe regularly criticizes President Trump and DHS on X and other social media platforms, with his posts collectively receiving well over 100,000 views. Now, DHS wants to obtain detailed information about Mr. Doe and his activities. The government sent an administrative summons to Google, ordering it to disclose “[a]ll records and other information” it possesses relating to the Gmail account Mr. Doe linked to his X account. DHS’s demand expressly includes Mr. Doe’s name, his location information, and data on his online activity—records that could allow the government to trace Mr. Doe’s physical movements and discern the things he reads online and the people with whom he communicates there. Court cases challenging similar summonses have involved the U.S. government targeting people inside the U.S. This case represents a potentially new and troubling development, as Mr. Doe is a Canadian citizen and resident. If DHS can surveil him, it may be able to monitor any critic anywhere on the globe. DHS’s actions in this case are unlawful. The government can act only based on authority conveyed via the Constitution or a statute and here, the statute DHS invoked provides no basis to issue the summons. Represented by the ACLU-DC and the ACLU of Northern California, Mr. Doe brings this case to stand up to DHS’s blatant abuse of government power.

Accountability NOW is a group of volunteers who have been holding a permitted, 24/7 anti-Trump vigil on National Park Service (NPS) land in Washington, D.C., for months. After they erected signs saying "Trump raped little girls,” and “Kids, if your parents are MAGA, they love child rapists,” NPS demanded they remove the signs because they are “obscene,” and therefore, not protected by the First Amendment. But the signs are not obscene. Legal obscenity is an extremely narrow exception to the First Amendment’s protection and does not apply to signs like these. For example, the media has extensively covered Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes on TV and online, but those reports do not satisfy the legal test for obscenity, which is designed to capture things like hardcore pornography that have no artistic or other value. This case shows why the test is so strict: If politicians could stop you from accusing them of sexual misconduct by saying that the accusation is obscene, they could avoid accountability. That’s what the First Amendment prevents. We are asking the court to prohibit NPS from revoking its demonstration permit on this trumped-up ground. We hope that this lawsuit will remind government officials to take Americans’ First Amendment rights seriously.

In March 2025, President Trump issued an order directing “every executive department and agency head . . . to revoke any active security clearances held by” a group of named individuals “and to immediately rescind their access to classified information.” That list included Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Cheney, former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, New York Attorney General Letitia James, former President Joseph Biden, “and any other member of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s family.” That list also included Mark Zaid, an attorney who represents national security whistleblowers and other clients in cases involving classified information—significantly including the intelligence community whistleblower whose disclosures resulted in President Trump’s first impeachment. President Trump has called Mr. Zaid a “sleazeball,” and has said “he should be sued and maybe for treason.” Mr. Zaid sued, and in December 2025 won a preliminary injunction restoring his clearance. The government appealed, and on March 27, 2026, we filed an amicus brief supporting him, together with the National ACLU, the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Rutherford Institute. Argument is scheduled for May 14, 2026.

In February 2026, we joined with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression and the National ACLU to file an amicus brief in this First Amendment case, supporting Media Matters for America. Media Matters for America is a research and journalistic nonprofit dedicated to monitoring and correcting misinformation in U.S. media. After Elon Musk purchased Twitter and renamed it X, Media Matters published articles reporting on increased “extremist and racist rhetoric” on X and about how advertisements for major companies were appearing adjacent to “pro-Nazi content.” Mr. Musk took offense and promised “a thermonuclear lawsuit against Media Matters.” X Corp. made good on Musk’s threat, suing Media Matters in Texas federal court and (through subsidiaries) in Ireland and Singapore. A California federal court preliminarily enjoined X Corp.’s lawsuit campaign, recognizing that it appeared designed more to bully Media Matters and inflict financial hardship than to pursue legitimate claims. Meanwhile, President Trump’s senior advisor Stephen Miller urged state attorneys general to focus on Media Matters, and the Texas and Missouri attorneys general answered his call and launched civil investigations, making onerous demands of Media Matters. Federal courts here in D.C. preliminarily enjoined both investigations on the ground that they likely amounted to First Amendment retaliation. Piling on, the new Trump-appointed Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, Andrew Ferguson, announced that the FTC would investigate purported “tech [platform] censorship” and “advertiser boycotts.” In numerous public statements, he and others made clear that the investigation was partisan and retributive, aimed at “progressives” and “leftists” who were allegedly seeking to “silence conservative voices.” The FTC issued a broad Civil Investigative Demand to Media Matters in May 2025 demanding information on a wide variety of expressive matters, including information about newsgathering and editorial decisions, programs. policies and objectives, financial material, and much more. Media Matters sued again, initiating this lawsuit, and again obtained a preliminary injunction. In a thorough opinion, Judge Sparkle Sooknanan concluded, “[t]his case presents a straightforward First Amendment violation.” The FTC appealed and is asking the court of appeals to allow it to continue its “investigation.” Our amicus brief shows how government investigations can be used to intimidate media outlets through procedural burdens and threats that themselves punish exercises of First Amendment rights. Allowing the FTC to pursue its investigation during the pendency of this case would continue to chill speech and journalism. Our brief also points out that this case is not an outlier. The FTC itself is currently using the same playbook in a series of burdensome “investigations” of advertising agencies and news rating organizations to censor speech the Commission doesn’t like. And government officials nationwide increasingly use burdensome investigations to target publications, platforms, and others for their views. The courts should be vigilant to protect legitimate media from such sham investigations.