Strategic Provocation

A Discussion with Simon Campbell

Poke a snarling dog. Repeat as needed.

I’ve written about this before, so skip to the boldfaced “Interview” section below if you already know the story of the free speech controversy in the Pennsbury School District. But that story matters again — matters more and more, really — as California prepares to implement SB 1100, a bill authorizing local governments to require orderly public comment at their meetings.

So.

In a series of public meetings last year, the Pennsbury school board in Bucks County, Pennsylvania faced criticism of the school district’s new equity policy, which it finally adopted in May. Local journalists would soon get their hands on email messages in which the school district’s DEI director had called on the board to silence critics of the policy, and more generally to prevent open criticism of DEI and critical race theory. Accusing a person offering public comment of “microaggressions as well as explicit racist ideas,” the school administrator called for an “in the moment process/procedure for determining what/when comments should be considered abusive, irrelevant or otherwise in conflict with the District’s policy on Public Participation at Board Meetings.” The school board president agreed, and wrote a letter to the community to promise that she would put a stop to “abusive and irrelevant” public comments — in other words, to impose content restrictions on the things the public could say at government meetings, consistent with board policy requiring civility in public comments.

The board did just that — with the help of a local lawyer, Peter Amuso, hired by the school district as an assistant general counsel. At the May 20 board meeting, the district’s lawyer repeatedly and aggressively cut off public comment — with, infamously, the shouted warning, “You’re DONE!”

Then, at the next meeting, they got run over by a freight train:

First Amendment litigation followed, with the help of the Institute for Free Speech. After a preliminary injunction forbidding the school district to restrict the content of public comment at board meetings, the Pennsbury school district settled the lawsuit with a $300,000 payment, most of which went to the lawyers; each individual plaintiff received $17.91, because 1791 is the year the First Amendment was adopted.

Oh, best part: The lawyer you hear shouting “You’re DONE” on the recording of the school board meeting is no longer a lawyer for the Pennsbury schools. Let’s all say it together: Peter Amuso, you’re DONE.

Interview

Because California is going down the same road the Pennsbury school board took, viewing harsh, loud, or directly personal criticism directed at individual local officials as disruptive and uncivil — and so as preventable, as speech that can be shut down — I asked to talk to Simon Campbell about the way he and his fellow plaintiffs defeated this maneuver in Pennsbury. I also asked to talk to the lawyers at the Institute for Free Speech, but they exercised their right to free speech by not directing any speech my way. Fair play, IFS, but send word if you’d like to talk sometime.