Today’s blacklisted American: Woman arrested in Arizona for publicly criticizing a public employee
They’re coming for you next: While making a public comment criticizing the town’s attorney at the local city council meeting for Surprise in Arizona, Rebekah Massie was ordered to either shut up or be arrested by the town’s mayor, Skip Hall, because the council does not allow citizens to make such criticisms during the public comment period.
When she had the audacity to note quite correctly that she was entirely within her first amendment rights to say whatever she wanted, Hall then had her arrested.
I have embedded the video of this event below. It is egregious beyond words.
Mayor Skip Hall of Surprise, AZ has a constituent arrested during a city council meeting for openly complaining about how much specific city employees are being paid pic.twitter.com/OkwqxynzdN
— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) August 25, 2024
As Massie states, her right to speak and say whatever she wants has been repeatedly confirmed by Supreme Court rulings. When Hall reads to the council’s rules against any such criticism during public comments, she responds, “That’s all fine and good, but that’s a violation of my first amendment rights.” When he claims she agreed to these rules she repeats, “It is unconstitutional.” His response illustrates his complete ignorance of and contempt for the law and our basic rights under the Bill of Rights, “It’s not unconstitutional.”
When still Massie refuses to be silenced Hall orders her to be removed. When she refuses to leave she is then violently arrested. Hall claimed she was resisting, but Massie later explained, she was “not resisting, my daughter is here, I don’t know what’s going on, you say I’m being detained, but I don’t know what for.”
Massie has an extremely strong case for suing Hall and the entire city council of Surprise for a lot of money. Her arrest was unnecessary for her to win and was probably a mistake on her part, but it makes no difference. The city council’s rule forbidding any criticism of any city employee is absurdly unconstitutional, and to use it to silence Massie makes Hall and that city council very liable for damages.
Mayor Skip Hall’s official picture, now apparently scrubbed
from the Surprise, Arizona government website
I strongly advise Massie to review my list of non-profit pro-free speech law firms to find one to represent her. For example, one of those law firms, the Institute for Free Speech, won an almost identical case in Pennsylvania. There, a school board had silenced three different individuals under similar foolish rules — written by incorrect advice of the board’s attorney — and was soon forced to settle the lawsuit against it, paying $300K in damages that also required it to fire that attorney.
That Pennsylvania story included the spectacular video below. The next school board meeting after the one in which that the lawyer silenced those three speakers, Simon Campbell, a former school board member, used his own time to tell the board and that lawyer how wrong they were, and how they were going to lose in court. I’ve posted his statement previously, but it is well worth posting again, because it provides a lesson that Skip Hall in Arizona needs to learn. I hope his fellow townspeople go out of their way to educate him, quite loudly.
Note that Hall’s official photo to the right is no longer available on the government website for Surprise. In fact, all information about him has apparently been removed. Unfortunately for him, that picture was made available by others on X, and includes his phone number. You can also still question him as well as all the city council members about their unconstitutional and censorious policies on the city’s website here.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
They’re coming for you next: While making a public comment criticizing the town’s attorney at the local city council meeting for Surprise in Arizona, Rebekah Massie was ordered to either shut up or be arrested by the town’s mayor, Skip Hall, because the council does not allow citizens to make such criticisms during the public comment period.
When she had the audacity to note quite correctly that she was entirely within her first amendment rights to say whatever she wanted, Hall then had her arrested.
I have embedded the video of this event below. It is egregious beyond words.
Mayor Skip Hall of Surprise, AZ has a constituent arrested during a city council meeting for openly complaining about how much specific city employees are being paid pic.twitter.com/OkwqxynzdN
— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) August 25, 2024
As Massie states, her right to speak and say whatever she wants has been repeatedly confirmed by Supreme Court rulings. When Hall reads to the council’s rules against any such criticism during public comments, she responds, “That’s all fine and good, but that’s a violation of my first amendment rights.” When he claims she agreed to these rules she repeats, “It is unconstitutional.” His response illustrates his complete ignorance of and contempt for the law and our basic rights under the Bill of Rights, “It’s not unconstitutional.”
When still Massie refuses to be silenced Hall orders her to be removed. When she refuses to leave she is then violently arrested. Hall claimed she was resisting, but Massie later explained, she was “not resisting, my daughter is here, I don’t know what’s going on, you say I’m being detained, but I don’t know what for.”
Massie has an extremely strong case for suing Hall and the entire city council of Surprise for a lot of money. Her arrest was unnecessary for her to win and was probably a mistake on her part, but it makes no difference. The city council’s rule forbidding any criticism of any city employee is absurdly unconstitutional, and to use it to silence Massie makes Hall and that city council very liable for damages.
Mayor Skip Hall’s official picture, now apparently scrubbed
from the Surprise, Arizona government website
I strongly advise Massie to review my list of non-profit pro-free speech law firms to find one to represent her. For example, one of those law firms, the Institute for Free Speech, won an almost identical case in Pennsylvania. There, a school board had silenced three different individuals under similar foolish rules — written by incorrect advice of the board’s attorney — and was soon forced to settle the lawsuit against it, paying $300K in damages that also required it to fire that attorney.
That Pennsylvania story included the spectacular video below. The next school board meeting after the one in which that the lawyer silenced those three speakers, Simon Campbell, a former school board member, used his own time to tell the board and that lawyer how wrong they were, and how they were going to lose in court. I’ve posted his statement previously, but it is well worth posting again, because it provides a lesson that Skip Hall in Arizona needs to learn. I hope his fellow townspeople go out of their way to educate him, quite loudly.
Note that Hall’s official photo to the right is no longer available on the government website for Surprise. In fact, all information about him has apparently been removed. Unfortunately for him, that picture was made available by others on X, and includes his phone number. You can also still question him as well as all the city council members about their unconstitutional and censorious policies on the city’s website here.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Related: It’s all related:
ROBERT MALONE ON WHY HE SUPPORTS TRUMP
“Read it if you like, it is a bit involved, but he plainly states what I have also been plainly stating regarding the psyops and desperate manipulations on going in our essential political decisions that must be correctly made by the people of America for the sake of our country and by extension the world. ”
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/dr-robert-malone
Just understand Greens and others like to disrupt things too.
As of 10:37pm 8/28, the link you provide to his government page does include the photo and phone number. So either it was de-scrubbed, or, more likely, was not actually scrubbed but just the page got hammered by visitors and stopped serving the image. The page you link in turn has a link to the Facebook for Surprise city mayor, and the comments on every post there are going wild.
I would expect they will settle with Mrs. Massie very quickly, because if this goes to a judge, there is lots of recent precedent that not only are they in the wrong and liable, but there is no grounds for any kind of limited liability or immunity and the mayor and possibly the arresting officers are themselves potentially liable for damages.
These School Boards seem to have an issue with GEOGRAPHY! Some of them seem to think they are located in some fascist Nazi Nation rather than The United States of America! Their “rules” concerning criticism of their performances are simply THEIR rules! Did the School District VOTE for those rules? NO! So if the BOARD established “decorum” rules then they are the only ones who are RULED by THEIR RULES! I do hope that Lady sues and WINS (as she should) and then the Mayor and School Board are all Voted OUT of office soon! This kind of DICTATORSHIP of SCHOOLS is prevalent and illegal so a few more PRECEDENTS might just wake a few of the “woke”!!
I pray that Ms. Massie sues them into the ground.
Simon Campbell brought tears to my eyes. Beautiful, thank you sir!
Thoughts and prayers for Great Britain.
Massie’s First Amendment rights give her the right to say whatever she likes without fear of arrest on her own time through any platform legally available to her. If the rules of the meeting forbid personally identified accusation or criticism of council members during question period, and she ignored directions to comply with those rules, she is disturbing the peace and is lawfully subject to arrest, just as much as the anti-Trump protestors screaming outside the homes of Supreme Court justices at three in the morning should have been.
“The city council’s rule forbidding any criticism of any city employee is absurdly unconstitutional….”
The rule doesn’t forbid criticism of city employees. It forbids using the question period of the public meeting to do so, because if such meetings couldn’t shut down people who did nothing except fling accusations and vituperation at the council-members in the guise of free speech, nothing could be done and there would be no point to having such meetings. Nor does the Pennsylvania case disprove that principle: the Pennsylvania school board lost their case not because they had such a rule but because the evidence showed they selectively enforced it to stifle criticism. We do not yet know if that is the case here. (I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it is. But it would help to know that first.)
Had Massie made her criticisms through a Facebook post, a letter to a local newspaper’s editor, or a sign and a megaphone on the sidewalk outside, the council would have had nothing to say about it. Her right to free speech doesn’t oblige the city council to let her commandeer its time as her platform, any more than the anti-Israel protestors’ rights obliged university campuses to allow them to commandeer the schools’ property.
Stephen J: You are wrong. The Supreme Court has been quite clear about this, in a number of rulings. Government officials have no right in any circumstance to limit the free speech of any citizen in any forum, except in those rare examples of direct violent threat. Government officials especially have no right to forbid citizens from criticizing them in a public forum.
If Massie sues she will win big.
I don’t know about the woman involved. The man in the video was clearly out of line in a way you would not tolerate on this blog.