Georgia has become the latest state to take up legislation seemingly designed to have a chilling effect on First Amendment rights. Georgia’s State Senate passed SB1 earlier this month and the bill is now before the lower house of the state’s General Assembly. It goes further than many of the other so-called ‘anti-protest bills’ introduced in other states, by expanding the legal definition of domestic terrorism and creating a state-level Department of Homeland Security with surveillance and intelligence sharing capabilities.
For more on SB1 and its implications, FSRN’s Shannon Young spoke with Azadeh Shahshahani, legal and advocacy director at Project South, a grassroots social justice organization based in Atlanta.
Shannon Young: Let’s start with what SB1 is purported to fight, which is domestic terrorism. How does the bill define domestic terrorism and how does it change the definition already in law?
Azadeh Shahshahani: It widely expands the definition of domestic terrorism in a way that would allow law enforcement to target groups of citizens who demonstrate in public places. So, for one thing, it vaguely suggests that efforts to advance any belief could be categorized under a new definition of domestic terrorism. It also broadens the definition of terroristic threats to include actions “with the purpose of otherwise causing serious public inconvenience.” The concern is there is no clear definition of a public inconvenience and there’s no clarity on who or what agency gets to define what this entails. Obviously, we are concerned that this bill will be used as a mechanism to further crack down on the rights of people who want to exercise their First Amendment right to protest.
Thrown in at the end of one of the sections of the legislation is quote: “This Code section shall not apply to constitutionally protected speech or lawful assemblies.” Do you find that reassuring?
No. That language is there, but if there’s some type of an activity — potentially violent…