{"id":486,"date":"2008-01-14T10:48:45","date_gmt":"2008-01-14T15:48:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/14\/fighting-for-free-speech-again\/"},"modified":"2008-01-14T12:09:29","modified_gmt":"2008-01-14T17:09:29","slug":"fighting-for-free-speech-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/2008\/01\/14\/fighting-for-free-speech-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Fighting for free speech – again"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bursey Continues Fight in Free Speech Appeal
\nDocument Reveals Disturbing Strategy By White House Advance Team<\/p>\n

BY DANIEL TERRILL
\nFree Times<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Local political activist and organizer Brett Bursey is persevering in his struggle to win a free speech case that has received national attention.<\/p>\n

On Dec. 28, Bursey\u2019s attorneys filed a motion in federal court in Columbia arguing that the U.S. government withheld evidence of White House involvement in suppressing protesters at presidential rallies.<\/p>\n

Bursey\u2019s attorneys recently obtained the Presidential Advance Manual, which contains detailed instructions on handling protestors and other disruptions during presidential events. <\/p>\n

Bursey, director of the South Carolina Progressive Network, contends that the White House has been using the Secret Service to protect the president politically. \u201cIt\u2019s really chilling,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s very bad news for the Bill of Rights, free speech and democracy.\u201d <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The government has 60 days to respond to the motion and Bursey says he will ask for a hearing on it.<\/p>\n

Malcolm Wiley, a spokesman for the Secret Service in Washington, D.C., says he has not heard of the Presidential Advance Manual. It sounds more like a White House guide, Wiley says.<\/p>\n

Bursey was arrested by Columbia Metropolitan Airport police for trespassing in October 2002 during a rally for President Bush at the airport. Bush spoke at the rally, which Bursey and other protesters targeted in the president\u2019s march to war against Iraq.<\/p>\n

The trespassing charge was dropped. <\/p>\n

But four months later Bursey found that he was being charged with a felony under the federal Presidential Assassinations, Kidnapping and Threats law, which was created in 1971 and had never been used before, he says.<\/p>\n

Deb Freel of Charleston and other supporters of local political activist and organizer Brett Bursey held a fundraiser at the federal courthouse in Columbia in February 2006. The event was dedicated to helping Bursey pay a $500 fine he received in a free speech case that has received national attention. File photo
\nBursey was convicted and fined $500.<\/p>\n

At trial, he says, \u201cWe asked for any documents from the Secret Service regarding protesters and they said there weren\u2019t any and we issued a subpoena.\u201d The government moved to suppress the subpoena, calling it a fishing expedition.<\/p>\n

The manual offers instructions on creating a political advance team to carry out most of the duties. Instructions about handling protesters include forming rally squads and having them ready to counter protest messages. Other guidelines involve dispatching the squads when a threat of political disruption arises and making sure protesters cannot be seen or heard by the media.<\/p>\n

Constitutional lawyer Michael Tigar, who teaches at Duke University, is Bursey\u2019s head attorney in the case and filed the motion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence shows that the White House and federal prosecutors have conspired to shut off speech criticizing George Bush while supporting pro-Bush speakers and demonstrators,\u201d Tigar says in a statement. \u201cProsecutors misled a federal court by denying the existence of a document that shows there was a plan to suppress peaceful debate about the war in Iraq and other important issues.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bursey Continues Fight in Free Speech Appeal Document Reveals Disturbing Strategy By White House Advance Team BY DANIEL TERRILL Free Times Local political activist and organizer Brett Bursey is persevering in his struggle to win a free speech case that … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,12,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national-newscommentary","category-network-newsevents","category-sc-newscommentary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=486"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scpronet.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}