Wingnut Group Claims Lying Is Free Speech, Supreme Court To Decide

Randa Morris

Two wingnut groups are challenging a law in the state of Ohio, that is meant to keep people from giving false statements in political ads.

Two wingnut groups are challenging a law in the state of Ohio, that is meant to keep people from lying in political ads. The two groups, the anti-choice Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List) and the tea party group, Coalition Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes (COAST), claim that Ohio’s False Statement Law violates their First Amendment right to free speech. After the case was tossed out in the Ohio Courts, the groups filed suit in Federal Court. On January 11, the Supreme Court announced that it will hear the case, a decision which could bring an end to the Ohio False Statement Law.

Ohio’s False Statement Law protects the state’s voters.

Ohio’s False Statement Law protects the state’s voters from the kinds of dishonest tactics that the right wing uses all the time. The law currently makes it illegal to “post, publish, circulate, distribute, or otherwise disseminate a false statement concerning a candidate, either knowing the same to be false or with reckless disregard for whether it was false or not, if the statement is designed to promote the election, nomination, or defeat of the candidate.”

SBA List didn’t like it when their billboards got shut down.

During the 2010 elections, SBA List wanted to advertise a false statement about Democratic candidate Steven Driehaus. The statement, which the group wanted to place on billboards, claimed that Driehaus voted in favor of tax payer funded abortions, when he voted for the Affordable Care Act. This was an obvious lie, since the ACA does not use taxpayer money and federal law clearly prohibits the use of public funds for abortion.
Driehaus filed a complaint with the Ohio Elections Committee (OEC). The OEC has limited powers. Under Ohio law they are allowed to investigate complaints and rule on False Statements. They may also refer cases for prosecution, if warranted. In this case, not only was there was no referral for prosecution, but the OEC never ruled on the statement, except to say that the complaint warranted further investigation.
SBA List did not run their false political ads in Ohio because the company that was going to rent billboard space to the group, backed out. This had nothing to do with the OEC or the False Statement Law, but happened because Driehaus contacted the company, personally.

COAST is afraid to lie, because the OEC might catch them.

The second group that joined the federal suit, COAST, has never had any dealings with the OEC. The group jumped on board the SBA List suit, claiming that the fear of having to prove their statements true before a government agency, kept them making similar untrue statements. So, this group is basically saying that they were afraid to lie, because another group got caught lying, and so that’s just not fair to them.

The Supreme Court could find Ohio’s False Statement Law unconstitutional.

Maybe not surprising, even though lower courts dismissed the case as baseless, the Supreme Court agreed to hear it. Given the courts track record on decisions of this nature, Ohio’s False statement Law will probably be found unconstitutional.
Reading through the documents filed with the Supreme Court, it’s hard to find any real justification for the federal lawsuit. It seems the case is being used by these right wing groups as an excuse to attack the OEC, which basically does little more than report to the voters on the truth about political statements. Of course, if they were forced to tell the truth, republicans would never win another election. Since lying is all they have left, it makes sense that they want to get rid of this law. The question is, will the Supreme Court help them do it?