The U.S. Department of Justice is urging the federal appeals court based in Denver to establish that the First Amendment protects the public s right to record police in the performance
(AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)
(CN) The state of Kansas asked a 10
th Circuit panel on Tuesday to preserve a law specifically targeting individuals who lie to gain access to animal processing plants for undercover investigations.
Nonprofit organization Animal Legal Defense Fund sued the state in 2018 arguing that the Kansas Farm Animal and Field Crop and Research Facilities Protection Act specifically targets journalists and animal rights activists who investigate the agriculture industry.
The so-called Ag-Gag law passed in 1990. A decade later, a federal judge found parts of the law violated the First Amendment. Kansas appealed.
“It’s not a question of whether you can use the First Amendment as a shield to protect you under trespassing acts, but rather where you limit the scope of trespass action based on this speech that’s intended,” U.S. Circuit Judge Carolyn McHugh, a Barack Obama appointee, said at Tuesday’s hearing.