With all the “terrorism enhancement” news this week, I missed some good news (I know, it’s shocking, GNR can be full of so much “eco-terrorism” gloom and doom). But on Tuesday a federal judge defended the rights of activists to protest despite the “terrorism” rhetoric of the fur salon’s owners.
Schumacher Furs has been the target of weekly protests by animal rights activists, and the owners have gone on the offensive: they’ve refused to mediate with the activists, calling them a “terrorist organization,” and have called on the government to use the newly-passed Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. (Here’s a more detailed account of this saga.)
From The Oregonian:
U.S. District Judge Michael W. Mosman wrote that concerns about jurisdiction and enforcement caused him to reject a motion by Schumacher Furs & Outerwear to impose limits on the protest rights of 20 unnamed protesters.
In a two-page order, Mosman wrote that he could not put restrictions on the free speech rights of the group “in order to prevent some from exceeding the bounds of protected activity.”