Adam Steinbaugh

Amicus brief from the Cato Institute, Dale Carpenter and Eugene Volokh urges full Fifth Circuit to affirm panel ruling that president of West Texas A&M violated the First Amendment when he ordered a drag show canceled, citing the show's purportedly "objectionable message." @cato.org

BY THE COURT: A petition for rehearing having been filed and a member of this Court in active service having requested a poll on whether this appeal should be reheard by the Court sitting en banc, and a majority of the judges in active service on this Court having voted in favor of granting rehearing en banc, IT IS ORDERED that this appeal will be reheard en banc. The panel's opinion is VACATED.

Eleventh Circuit vacates panel opinion on Florida's anti-drag law, will rehear the case en banc.

For *two* of those tickets you could enter the Eagles stadium

Ask for the government relations team’s communications, too, and explicitly state you want records held on private phones/networks. Most universities are smart enough to avoid email now.

StubHub screenshot: $12 including fees

This is what it would cost to go to the Broncos/Commanders game. I can’t even look at the Eagles stadium for this amount of

SHOTS FIRED, 2 National Guard, downtown DC, just now. At least one dead. Near Farragut metro.

Opinion | Nobody Should Go to Jail for a Harmless Meme

Larry Bushart, a retired police officer, went to jail for 36 days for posting a meme after the murder of Charlie Kirk! It was a picture of Donald Trump along with his comment in response to a school shooting in 2024: “We have to get over it.” The meme had the caption, “This seems relevant today.”

Two Republican-appointed judges on the 3-judge panel:

Oral arguments were held eight days ago.

The district court decided that the amended complaint advanced legal theories foreclosed by precedent “that the most basic legal research would have revealed.” It listed several examples, including Trump’s statutory and equitable tolling theories. Trump and Habba argue that “the case law is unsettled or there was a reasonable request for an extension of the law,” at least for the tolling argument. Many of Trump’s and Habba’s legal arguments were indeed frivolous. Even setting aside the tolling arguments, the district court ruled that Trump brought several frivolous claims, including a “malicious prosecution claim without a prosecution,” and a “trade secret claim without a trade secret.” Trump also appended seven counts to his indictment which did not allege any cause of action and which the district court found were “the high-water mark of shotgun pleading.” Trump leaves all these frivolous claims behind, making a total of 11 of his 16 claims he does not appeal. Trump and Habba give us no reason to reverse the district court’s ruling that these claims were frivolous

Eleventh Circuit affirms $1 million sanctions award against Trump attorneys, led by Alina Habba, for frivolous "racketeering" lawsuit against Hillary Clinton (among many others): storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

Do not go to Fairhope, Alabama, which is still defending this arrest of a No Kings protester because it violated a police officer's "values." Full video via @al.com here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgop...

A screenshot of the Dallas Police incident report

A screenshot of the FBI report

Last Thanksgiving, two Dallas Police officers knocked on my door, citing a tip from the FBI national threat operations center that I was beating my girlfriend. The incident report confirms this. Today, I obtained a file from the FBI via FOIA that states the FBI has no record of receiving such a tip.

Trump’s argument is unpersuasive. First, although he concedes that CNN’s use of the term “Big Lie” is, to some extent, ambiguous, he assumes that it is unambiguous enough to constitute a statement of fact. This assumption is untenable. Although we haven’t squarely addressed the point, case law from other circuits is persuasive. In Buckley v. Littell, 539 F.2d 882 (2d Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 1062 (1977), the Second Circuit held that, by using the terms “fascist,” “fellow traveler,” and “radical right” to describe William F. Buckley, Jr., the defendant was not publishing “statements of fact.” Buckley, 539 F.2d at 893. Rather, the court ruled, the terms were “so debatable, loose and varying[] that they [we]re insusceptible to proof of truth or falsity.” Id. at 894. Similarly, in Ollman v. Evans, 750 F.2d 970 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (en banc), cert. denied, 471 U.S. 1127 (1985), the D.C. Circuit held that when the defendant called the plaintiff “an outspoken proponent of political Marxism,” his statement was “obviously unverifiable.” Ollman, 750 F.2d at 987. Trump argues that the term “Big Lie” is less ambiguous than the terms “fascist,” “fellow traveler,” “radical right,” and “outspoken proponent of political Marxism.” But he does not explain this assertion. If “fascist”—a term that is, by definition, political—

is ambiguous, then it follows that “Big Lie”—a term that is facially apolitical—is at least as ambiguous. Second, Trump’s argument hinges on the fact that his own interpretation of his conduct—i.e., that he was exercising a constitutional right to identify his concerns with the integrity of elections—is true and that CNN’s interpretation—i.e., that Trump was peddling his “Big Lie”—is false. However, his conduct is susceptible to multiple subjective interpretations, including CNN’s. As we held in Turner, one person’s “subjective assessment” is not rendered false by another person’s “different conclusion.” 879 F.3d at 1264. In Turner, the defendants stated that, on at least one occasion, the plaintiff, James Turner, offensive line coach of the Miami Dolphins, participated in the “homophobic taunting” of one of his players. Id. Turner argued that this statement was false because his conduct was a “harmless ‘joke,’ as opposed to homophobic taunting.” Id. We rejected his argument, concluding that the statement “[wa]s the [d]efendants’ subjective assessment of Turner’s conduct and [wa]s not readily capable of being proven true or false.” Id. Just as the Turner defendants described Turner’s conduct as “homophobic taunting,” CNN described Trump’s conduct as his “Big Lie.” Just as Turner viewed his own conduct as a “harmless ‘joke,’” Trump viewed his own conduct as the exercise of a constitutional right. As in Turner, so too here. CNN’s subjective assessment of Trump’s conduct is not readily capable of being proven true or false.

Eleventh Circuit affirms dismissal of Trump defamation lawsuit against CNN for calling his election denialism the "Big Lie"

Opinion: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

I am not the brains behind this operation. This one is @ctfitzpatrick.bsky.social and Bob Corn-Revere and Greg Greubel.

feels like a line accidentally left out of The Boys Are Back In Town

We represent her.

This lawsuit was a copycat of the two still-pending lawsuits filed by Trump against Selzer. (Yes, two.) Those suits remain pending for now.

VICTORY! Federal district court dismisses class-action suit against pollster J. Ann Selzer Federal district court tosses ‘fake news’ lawsuit against pollster J. Ann Selzer, affirming First Amendment protections for election commentary.

VICTORY: Federal court dismisses class action lawsuit against pollster J. Ann Selzer, filed by the “Center for American Rights”

www.thefire.org/news/victory...

Wrong still in Velcro

A retired policeman posted a Charlie Kirk meme. He spent a month in jail. The 61-year-old Tennessee man plans to sue after authorities dropped charges over a political Facebook post. Free-speech advocates say it’s a symptom of a wider crackdown.

It's insane that this even needs to be said.

“A free country does not dispatch police in the dead of night to pull people from their homes because a sheriff objects to their social media posts,” @adamsteinbaugh.bsky.social speaking to @willoremus.com.

www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/...

LEXINGTON, Tenn. (WKRN) — The charges against Larry Bushart have been dropped, according to local law enforcement. Bushart, a retired law enforcement officer who posted dozens of memes critical of President Donald Trump, was arrested by Lexington police and booked into the Perry County Jail in September over one meme in particular. The Perry County Sheriff and Court Clerk confirmed to News 2 on Wednesday Bushart’s charges were dropped.

BREAKING: Charges against Larry Bushart over a meme quoting President Trump have been dropped: www.wkrn.com/news/charges...

It's good that LPD is clarifying this because police officers knocking on doors and demanding people delete posts would be absolutely nuts

The Sheriff sits down in his office for an interview to argue that he *had* to arrest Larry Bushart for posting a meme quoting President Trump. www.newschannel5.com/news/newscha...

In a statement to News 2, Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems claimed, “We coordinated with other departments to approach Mr. Bushart and provide options to de-escalate the situation before an arrest was made. Mr. Bushart declined to clarify his public messages and calm the situation that was causing multiple, reasonable citizens to be in fear of their children’s safety at school.” News 2 asked Weems via text message, “What agency did you work with to try to have Larry Bushart clarify and deescalate?” Weems replied, “My investigator reached out to Lexington pd.” When News 2 asked Lexington’s police chief whether his department was involved in any way with asking Bushart to deescalate or clarify his messages, the chief responded, “No.”

The Sheriff's story about the arrest of Larry Bushart over a Trump/Kirk meme continues to fall apart.

Sheriff claims the arrest was necessary because Bushart refused to "clarify" to local police that his meme wasn't a threat. The police department says that's not true.

www.wkrn.com/news/local-n...

The Absurd Prosecution of a Man Who Posted a Charlie Kirk Meme Larry Bushart Jr. posted trolling memes on a Facebook thread about a vigil for Kirk. He’s been in a Tennessee jail ever since.

Former cop is in jail for committing thought crime against the memory of Charlie Kirk theintercept.com/2025/10/23/c...

This is absolutely insane. Must read

The sheriff said the post caused “mass hysteria” among parents and teachers.

But the school district says they don't have a single record about it -- and the sheriff's department says it won't respond to public records requests.

I mean... decent chance it is.

Who got pardoned now