Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is most known for its work taking up controversial religious freedom cases. They famously defended Jack Phillips, a baker who was the subject of a high-profile suit after he declined to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. More recently, the organization argued in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in favor of Lorie Smith, a website designer who preemptively challenged a Colorado law so that she would not have to design wedding sites for gay couples in violation of her religious beliefs.
They are not known for defending foul-mouthed, left-leaning journalists whose bread and butter consists sometimes of criticizing the police. They’re doing so anyway.
That journalist is Priscilla Villarreal, whose presence in Laredo, Texas, is associated with her profanity-laced commentary on law enforcement and who police jailed for the crime of asking the government questions, getting answers, and publishing those responses. That would appear to be a fairly cut-and-dry infringement on her First Amendment rights. Yet, it’s a question that has stumped the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit in a case that could have far-reaching implications for anyone engaged in journalism, regardless of their political bent.
[I am a big fan of ADF for precisely this reason. It would have been easy to look the other way and let Villareal find assistance from progressive legal orgs, but ADF is committed to the First Amendment in all of its forms. Maybe someone should alert the Southern Poverty Law Center, which seems conspicuously absent from Villareal’s defense in Reason’s reporting. — Ed]
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