(Just The News)—The legal doctrine of government speech, which inhibits individual First Amendment rights, got a massive expansion from the Pacific to the Rockies thanks to a federal appeals court that upheld ideological requirements for ongoing professional licensing rules, according to lawyers for a California doctor challenging her state’s rules.
The Pacific Legal Foundation told Just the News it will file a petition for rehearing by the full 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals following a three-judge panel’s ruling Friday that deemed the Golden State’s mandatory “implicit bias” training in accredited continuing medical education, of which doctors must complete 50 hours every two years, government speech.
Beyond California, the ruling blesses current or potential ideological requirements in CME in Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Arizona, Idaho, Alaska, Montana and Hawaii. The panel was nominated by presidents Clinton, Obama and Biden, all Democrats.
The logic of the ruling means “there is little to stop governments around the country from compelling continuing education instructors in any trade or profession to profess all manner of controversial state-endorsed topics,” said PLF lead attorney Caleb Trotter.
It’s a “dangerous misuse” of government speech prohibited by the Supreme Court’s 2017 Matal ruling against a statutory ban on “disparag[ing]” trademarks including for the Asian-American rock band The Slants, Trotter said, quoting Matal.
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