Florida judge blocks enforcement of anti-riot law backed by DeSantis Free speech “continues to be chilled” because the new measure is vague, judge says. (WaPo)

Once again,  our Florida legislature has violated the First Amendment.  

Once again, United States District Court Chief Judge Mark Walker for the Northern District of Florida has vindicated constitutional rights.

We are blessed to have him in Tallahassee, a bulwark against oppression.

DeSANTIS admitted most Florida protests were tame.  Here in St. Augustine, the BLM protesters and local police were civil, orderly and profssional.   No one was hurt. No property was destroyed.  

Saint Augustine said, "An unjust law is no law at all."

We don't need any more Dull Republican "unjust laws" stirring up hatred and animosity,

From The Washington Post:

Florida judge blocks enforcement of anti-riot law backed by DeSantis

Free speech “continues to be chilled” because the new measure is vague, judge says.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis answers questions related to school openings and the wearing of masks on Aug. 10 in Surfside, Fla. (Marta Lavandier/AP)

By 

Lori Rozsa

September 9, 2021 at 7:06 p.m. EDT

In a second court loss this week for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a federal judge on Thursday squelched one of the governor’s key pieces of legislation by blocking enforcement of a so-called anti-riot law, saying that it chills free speech.

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker wrote that DeSantis’s “new definition of ‘riot’ ” is vague and overbroad and criminalizes “vast swaths of core First Amendment speech.”

DeSantis (R) made passage of the measure his top priority in the 2021 legislative session. He and the Republican-controlled legislature sought the law in response to the massive civil rights protests that took place nationwide in 2020 following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

While acknowledging that most of the protests in Florida were tame, DeSantis said in April that he was glad to sign “the strongest anti-rioting, pro-law enforcement piece of legislation in the country.”

Several groups quickly sued, including Dream Defenders and the American Civil Liberties Union. The groups said they feared holding any kinds of protests because they didn’t know how the law would be enforced.

Walker agreed, and said “their speech continues to be chilled” because the law is vague.

He said the legislation changed the “common law definition of riot” that the state has used for decades into something that is unclear.

“Tossing Molotov cocktails at the police station with 10 of your best friends is clearly rioting,” Walker wrote, but the new law isn’t that specific.

The law prohibits “willfully participating in a violent public disturbance,” but Walker ruled that the state doesn’t clearly define what that is.

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Another target for Republican-controlled states—the right to peacefully protest

“Is it enough to stand passively near violence?” he wrote. “What if you continue protesting when violence erupts? What if that protest merely involves standing with a sign while others fight around you? Does it depend on whether your sign expresses a message that is pro- or anti-law enforcement? What about filming the violence? What if you are in the process of leaving the disturbance and give a rioter a bottle of water to wash tear gas from their eyes?”

DeSantis said the state will appeal. When asked about Walker’s decision at a news conference on Thursday, he said he’s confident that the state will prevail. Walker has ruled against the DeSantis administration in other cases, including last year when the state narrowed the rights of felons to vote. Walker’s ruling was overturned by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.

“That’s a foreordained conclusion from that court,” DeSantis said about Walker’s decision on the riot bill. “I guarantee you, we’ll win that on appeal.”

DeSantis’s administration is also appealing a decision from a different judge this week that prohibits the state from punishing school districts if they enact mask mandates to fight the spread of the coronavirus.

Walker’s decision on the riot bill was welcomed by the groups that sued the state.

The ACLU called it “a major victory for civil rights and racial justice advocates.”