EU legal expert says online defamation enforceable worldwide

June 4, 2019

BRUSSELS (AP) — A top European Union legal adviser said Tuesday that social media networks like Facebook could be ordered to take down anywhere in the world any text, photo or other media ruled to be defamatory by a court.

The U.S. social network said the opinion risks letting countries undermine freedom of expression beyond their borders.

The case concerns a Facebook user who shared an online article on their personal page about Austrian Greens politician Eva Glawischnig-Piesczek.

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In his legal opinion , EU Court of Justice Advocate General Maciej Szpunar said companies like Facebook can be ordered by a court “to seek and identify” duplicate copies of information that a court has deemed illegal posted by any users of a platform.

Szpunar added that because European law on electronic commerce “does not regulate the territorial scope of an obligation to remove information disseminated via a social network platform,” platforms can be ordered to remove the information posted by users worldwide.

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Navy acknowledges request was made to hide USS John S. McCain during Trump visit

"A request was made to the U.S. Navy to minimize the visibility of USS John S. McCain" during President Donald Trump's recent state visit to Japan, the Navy said in a statement.

June 1, 2019, 6:22 AM EDT
By Max Burman and Courtney Kube
The U.S. Navy has acknowledged that a request was made to hide the USS John S. McCain during President Donald Trump's recent state visit to Japan.

"A request was made to the U.S. Navy to minimize the visibility of USS John S. McCain, however, all ships remained in their normal configuration during the President's visit," Rear Admiral Charlie Brown, chief of information, said in a statement to NBC News.

"There were also no intentional efforts to explicitly exclude Sailors assigned to USS John S. McCain," the statement said.

Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said Friday he’d asked his chief of staff to “look into” the reported request from the White House to move the ship "out of sight" during Trump's visit.

“Our business is to run military operations and not become politicized,” Shanahan told reporters during a news conference in Singapore. “I would not have moved the ship," he added.

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Judges: Feds must act if asked to take a fresh look at pot

By LARRY NEUMEISTER
May 31, 2019

NEW YORK (AP) — A federal appeals court has ruled that the Drug Enforcement Administration must “act promptly” if formally asked to take another look at laws that consider marijuana as dangerous as heroin or LSD.

The ruling came Thursday in a 2-to-1 vote by judges from the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals who agreed that the plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the DEA and other parts of the federal government needed to ask the agency to change its designations for marijuana before bringing the issue to the courts.

The plaintiffs — which include the Cannabis Cultural Association and an Iraq war veteran who suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder — now have an opening to persuade federal authorities to change how they classify marijuana. Many states have legalized recreational pot use, but marijuana is still illegal under federal law.

“It is possible that the current law, though rational once, is now heading towards irrationality; it may even conceivably be that it has gotten there already,” wrote Judge Guido Calabresi.

“A sensible response to our evolving understanding about the effects of marijuana might require creating new policies just as much as changing old ones,” Calabresi added in a majority opinion that included the conclusions of Judge Jed S. Rakoff, a district judge sitting on the Manhattan appeals court temporarily.

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Judge says Missouri clinic can keep providing abortions

By JIM SALTER and DAVID A. LIEB
May 31, 2019

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A judge issued an order Friday to keep Missouri’s only abortion clinic operating over the objections of state health officials, delivering abortion-rights advocates a courtroom victory after a string of setbacks in legislatures around the U.S.

St. Louis Circuit Judge Michael Stelzer said Planned Parenthood’s St. Louis clinic can continue providing abortions despite the Missouri health department’s refusal to renew its license over a variety of patient safety concerns. He said the temporary restraining order was necessary to “prevent irreparable injury” to Planned Parenthood.

With the abortion license set to expire at midnight Friday, Planned Parenthood pre-emptively sued this week and argued that the state was “weaponizing” the licensing process. Planned Parenthood said that absent court intervention, Missouri would become the first state without an abortion clinic since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized the procedure nationwide.

The clinic’s license will remain in effect until a ruling is issued on Planned Parenthood’s request for a permanent injunction, Stelzer’s ruling says. A hearing is set for Tuesday morning.

“Today is a victory for women across Missouri, but this fight is far from over,” Planned Parenthood Federation of America CEO Dr. Leana Wen said in a statement. “We have seen just how vulnerable access to abortion care is here — and in the rest of the country.”

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Baseball team loses sponsor over Ocasio-Cortez ‘enemies of freedom’ video

By Kayla Epstein, Marisa Iati and Reis Thebault May 30 at 11:33 AM

A major sponsor with deep local roots has ended its partnership with the Fresno Grizzlies after the minor league baseball team aired a Memorial Day video that included Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) among America’s “enemies of freedom” — alongside North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and the late Cuban president Fidel Castro.

The raisin company Sun-Maid confirmed through a spokeswoman that it is terminating its sponsorship of the Grizzlies after the team showed the video at Chukchansi Park on Monday.

“This decision is not meant to provide any political perspective whatsoever,” Sun-Maid said in a statement to The Washington Post. “It doesn’t matter which end of the political spectrum you’re on; we have taken this action as we simply believe this is the right thing to do.”

“We have discussed our position with Grizzlies management and wish them well as they manage through this matter,” Sun-Maid said.

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GoFundMe Border Wall Ordered to Stop Building Because They Didn’t Have the Right Paperwork

The $20 million crowdfunded project to do what Trump hasn’t done hit, well, a wall.

Jordyn Rozensky,
Will Sommer
05.28.19 7:46 PM ET

SUNLAND PARK, New Mexico—We Build the Wall, a privately funded effort to build a barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border, was told to stop building on Tuesday.

The cease-and-desist order represents a new obstacle for the group and its founder, triple-amputee veteran Brian Kolfage. Kolfage’s crowdfunding effort became a cause célèbre on the right last December, when he rapidly raised $20 million on GoFundMe for the wall. So far they have built less than a half-mile of fence on the border.


Sunland Park Mayor Javier Perea said at a press conference the city issued a cease-and-desist order, saying it is in violation of city ordinances. George Cudahy, whose company owns the land where the wall is being built, submitted an application for a building permit last week. Sunland Park officials declared the application incomplete, Perea said, because it lacked a site plan development and included contradictory information around the construction.

Boris Johnson, favorite to be Britain's next PM, to face court for alleged Brexit lies

By Sheena McKenzie
Updated 1102 GMT (1902 HKT) May 29, 2019

London (CNN) — The leading candidate to succeed Theresa May as British Prime Minister has been ordered to appear in court to face allegations he lied to the public during the 2016 Brexit referendum campaign.

A judge at Westminster Magistrate's Court in London ordered that Boris Johnson, a former UK foreign secretary, must face a private summons on three counts of misconduct in public office.

Johnson, who was the high-profile face of the Leave campaign, is accused of falsely claiming that Britain's membership of the European Union cost £350 million ($442 million) a week.

The claim was plastered on the side of a bus that toured Britain during the tightly fought campaign that resulted in a 52% vote in favor of the UK leaving the EU.

"Having considered all the relevant factors I am satisfied that this is a proper case to issue the summons as requested for the three offenses as drafted," wrote Judge Margot Coleman.

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China is indicating it’ll never give in to US demands to change its state-run economy

PUBLISHED MON, MAY 27 2019 4:46 AM EDT UPDATED 2 HOURS AGO

Evelyn Cheng

As trade talks between the U.S. and China increasingly center on Chinese treatment of foreign companies, Beijing says major American complaints about structural aspects of its economy are running up against “core interests.”

The implication: Those matters are not up for negotiation.

Previously, the vague “core interest” term was generally understood as referring to Beijing’s territorial claims, such as those on Taiwan. But a commentary piece published this weekend by state news agency Xinhua emphasized that China will not yield on its prerogative about how to manage its economy.

The Chinese-language article published Saturday claimed there were five ways in which the U.S. is harming the growth of the global economy by launching a trade war with the Asian giant.

“At the negotiating table, the U.S. government has made many arrogant requests, including restricting the development of state-owned enterprises,” the commentary said, according to a CNBC translation. “Obviously, this is beyond the field and scope of trade negotiations, (and) touches upon China’s fundamental economic system.”

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‘Revolution’ in Poland as nation confronts priestly abuse

By VANESSA GERA
May 25, 2019

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — One victim spoke out, and then another, and another. A statue of a pedophile priest was toppled in Gdansk, put back by his supporters, and finally dismantled for good. A feature film about clerical abuse was a box office hit.

Poland thought it had started confronting the problem of clerical abuse and its cover-up by church authorities. Then a bombshell came: A documentary with victim testimony so harrowing it has forced an unprecedented reckoning with pedophile priests in one of Europe’s most deeply Catholic societies.

Poland’s bishops acknowledged this week they face a crisis and made a rare admission that they have failed to protect the young. It’s also a crisis for the country’s conservative government, which is closely aligned with the Catholic Church, putting the ruling Law and Justice party on the defensive before Sunday’s European Parliament vote in Poland.

The documentary ”Tell No One ” was directed by journalist Tomasz Sekielski. Before its release on May 11, ruling party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski had described discussion about clerical abuse as a “brutal attack” on the church and portrayed the LGBT rights movement as the key threat to children in the country. But the revelations in the documentary have pushed the party to face up to the cleric abuse crisis. It has vowed stiffer penalties for pedophilia, although its leaders have avoided pointing a finger at the church specifically.

Across the country, the film has triggered soul searching and raised questions, including whether the same bishops who moved perpetrators from parish to parish for years will be capable of cleansing the church. Some wonder if Poland, which is already being reshaped by economic growth and secularization, could eventually follow Ireland, where the abuse crisis broke the Catholic Church’s hold on society.

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