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FEMA Sued Over "Presidential Alert" Text Warning

posted by chromas on Saturday October 06 2018, @09:25PM   

takyon writes:

Lawsuit seeks to stop FEMA's "Presidential Alert" system to cellphones citing First Amendment violation

A new lawsuit filed in New York is seeking to stop the implementation of FEMA's new "Presidential Alert" messaging system, an alert used for national emergencies that can be deployed by President Trump. Plaintiffs in Manhattan are suing Mr. Trump and FEMA Administrator Brock Long, claiming the alert system is a "violation of Americans' First and Fourth Amendment rights to be free from Government-compelled listening, as well as warrantless, non-consensual trespass into and seizure of their cellular devices."

Plaintiffs compare the alert system to "hijacking private property for the purpose of planting a Government-controlled loudspeaker in the home and on the person of every American." This new presidential alert is nationwide and only used for advance warning of national crises.

According to FEMA, the alert is not a text or SMS (short message service) but an audio and text warning that will display as a notification across a user's cellphone -- similar to the ones carriers receive during Amber Alerts and weather emergencies.

Previously: FEMA Emergency Test Message to be Sent to Most U.S. Cell Phones on Sept. 20 (or Oct. 3)
What to Expect From the U.S. Wireless Emergency Alert Test Today

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Original Submission

• First thought (Score: 5, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Saturday October 06 2018, @09:58PM

  by hemocyanin (186) on Saturday October 06 2018, @09:58PM (#745208) Journal

  At first I was thinking "wtf" but on reading the complaint, it makes sense -- see paragraphs 20 & 21 at the second link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bNkhKVRAFFMrGBqib_fUVsq7b0uteyCv/preview [google.com]

  Paragraph 20 cites Kovacs v. Cooper: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/336/77/ [justia.com]

  The use of sound trucks and other peripatetic or stationary broadcasting devices for advertising, for religious exercises, and for discussion of issues or controversies has brought forth numerous municipal ordinances. ...

  City streets are recognized as a normal place for the exchange of ideas by speech or paper. But this does not mean the freedom is beyond all control. We think it is a permissible exercise of legislative discretion to bar sound trucks with broadcasts of public interest, amplified to a loud and raucous volume, from the public ways of municipalities. ...

  ... Section 4 of the ordinance bars sound trucks from broadcasting in a loud and raucous manner on the streets. There is no restriction upon the communication of ideas or discussion of issues by the human voice, by newspapers, by pamphlets, by dodgers.

  And also Martin v. Struthers: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/319/141.html [findlaw.com]

  For centuries it has been a common practice in this and other countries for persons not specifically invited to go from home to home and knock on doors or ring doorbells to communicate ideas to the occupants or to invite them to political, religious, or other kinds of public meetings. ...

  Freedom to distribute information to every citizen wherever he desires to receive it is so clearly vital to the preservation of a free society that, putting aside reasonable police and health regulations of time and manner of distribution, it must be fully preserved. The dangers of distribution can so easily be controlled by traditional legal methods, leaving to each householder the full right to decide whether he will receive strangers as visitors, that stringent prohibition can serve no purpose but that forbidden by the Constitution, the naked restriction of the dissemination of ideas.

  Starting Score:	1		point
  Moderation		+3
  Interesting=2, Informative=1, Total=3
  Extra 'Interesting' Modifier		0
  Karma-Bonus Modifier		+1
  Total Score:		5