Banned for encouraging people to never forget 9/11.

Sanctioned for mentioning Jefferson County’s terrible meth problem, chronic unemployment, shrinking job base and high poverty rate.

That’s what I’ve learned about how Jefferson County operates the public forum of it’s official Facebook page. Thanks to the people who sued President Trump and won when he blocked them from his Twitter feed, the law is clear that the First Amendment governs the actions of public officials in how they manage their official social media forums. They cannot engage in content-based discrimination. They cannot retaliate or punish. They cannot suppress speech that does not fall into one of the very limited exceptions of the First Amendment.

Encouraging people to remember the terrorist attacks, deaths and heroism of 9/11….definitely protected speech. Speaking out on our county’s drug and economic problems….definitely protected speech. But it is for expressing those opinions that I was sanctioned by whichever public official made those decisions.

So I sued Jefferson County in federal court for these First Amendment violations.

Thanks to the answer filed by Jefferson County in the case, I saw where I had incorrectly reconstructed what I believed happened on 9/10/20, where I thought this story started. I had believed that a comment about COVID issues had been deleted. I was wrong. The county has the activity log that shows they “hid” my comment that linked to a video about 9/11. That video is a gut-wrenching thing to watch, because what happened on that day was and is forever a nightmare to anyone with an ounce of love for life, liberty and this nation of ours.

Watch it for yourself: https://www.prageru.com/video/9-11-we-must-never-forget/

Why would the Jefferson County government not want people remembering 9/11? What was so objectionable about that video that I was later banned from participating in discussions on this public forum?  

What I learned is that the county will make invisible comments it does not want other people to see. The author may see the comment and does not know that it has been made invisible to most everyone else. You could be seeing a comment from someone that has been made invisible to others because you happened to have “friended” that person (though you may not actually know them). You will have no idea that you could be alone in receiving what that person has to say about matters of public concern and county business.

The county says they made my 9/11 video link invisible because it was “off topic.” I am not aware that “off topic” is a recognized ground for government to censor or sanction speech. I know of no case at this time holding that “off topic” is an exception to the First Amendment. But “off topic” is their excuse.

I posted the video about 9/11 on 9/10 for good reason. The county’s Facebook page has published proclamations on other things, such as Earth Day. It had made no mention whatsoever of any commemoration of 9/11. My comment was intended to correct that omission. It was a protest of the county’s failure to honor that day and those who died and an attempt to bring attention to that failure. Protesting and bringing attention to a government’s failure is pure political speech that cannot be censored. The county saying it was “off topic” (it wasn’t) doesn’t outrank the First Amendment. The City of Port Townsend at the time was embroiled in a growing controversy because it had cancelled the annual ringing of the old fire bell at the hour the first plane hit the Twin Towers. The county was not indicating it would honor that day. It was silent about 9/11. So I posted that “Never Forget 9/11” video. This is pure political speech protected by the First Amendment.

The next day, 9/11, came and went without any mention by the county of the events of that day in 2001. Courthouse bells rang, but without any explanation by the county.

Sometime after that I was banned from participating in the public forum the county created with its official Facebook page that allows comments (except those it disagrees with). I could not comment. I could not even “like” or “dislike” a pronouncement or news development published by the county.

I had received no notice that I had been sanctioned or why. That is something else I’ve discovered since I filed suit: the county sanctions people–deleting or “hiding” their comments, banning them from commenting–without any notice or explanation. As I mentioned, if you receive the sanction of your speech being “hidden” you have no idea that has happened. You have to sit down with someone who is not a Facebook friend and ask them if they can see on their computer what you wrote. If they cannot, then you just learned you have received the official sanction of having your speech censored.

There is no appeal process. You can sue, though you shouldn’t have to.

After my lawsuit was served on the county, they seem to have lifted (without notice to me) the sanction that prevented me from expressing opinions and sharing information to others viewing their Facebook public forum. 

Then they again sanctioned me without notice, without explanation. I discovered that a comment I made in January 2021 about the county’s terrible meth problem, chronic poverty, shrinking job base and severe poverty resulted in the county sanction of making the comment invisible. The sanction was curious, because I was responding to a comment by another person about some of the same problems, particularly the drug problem right now at the County Fairgrounds where a young woman, a meth user, was found dead, lying face down on the ground in the open where in happier times children have played and people have enjoyed rides and 4-H animal exhibits.

I don’t know if my comment about our terrible meth problem was made invisible by county officials before or after the campground manager came across this poor woman’s stone-cold body and called police. 

The county says it prohibits profanity, but now that I’ve examined the entire history of comments I see an F-bomb and other profanity. The county says it prohibits promotion of business and political candidates, but I’ve found examples of that. The county says it prohibits insults and personal attacks, but I’ve found plenty of those. The county says it prohibits comments that embed images from external sources or that contain copyrighted material. I’ve also found plenty of examples where they don’t enforce that rule, either. But the county sure is good at prohibiting my speech when it disagrees with the narrative they want enforced in that public forum. 

I intend to amend my complaint to include these facts and others I’ve learned since our initial pleading. There will be a bit of a delay. My attorney suffered a health crisis requiring emergency surgery. The county’s attorney has graciously agreed to push things back 90 days. I also still hope we can settle this.

Given the pesky First Amendment, running an official government social media site is fraught with problems. Every decision the county makes about its Facebook page is state action triggering First Amendment review. As I’ve learned, it also triggers rights of due process. I hope my attorney and I in cooperation with the county can find a solution that cures the currently unconstitutional and illegal manner in which the county is managing this public forum.

A curious thing occurred recently. In response to publication of a proclamation by the Board of County Commissioners in January about the Port Townsend Women’s March, I posted in a comment the same “Never Forget 9/11” video that got me banned after I posted it on 9/10/20. Nothing happened. The comment was not made invisible and my First Amendment rights to participate in the public forum were not taken from me. 

Like I said, one shouldn’t have to file a federal lawsuit to prevent the government from censoring his political speech. But apparently going to court does improve how a citizen gets treated.