\u201cSince January 2017, a number of undemocratic bills have been proposed in state legislatures with the purpose or effect of criminalizing peaceful protests,\u201d<\/em> the UN\u2019s top experts on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, David Kaye and Maina Kiai, said in a recent\u00a0statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n Read more<\/p>\n The proposed bills, if approved \u201cwould severely infringe upon the exercise of the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly,\u201d <\/em>the statement says, noting that it would be \u201cincompatible with US obligations under international human rights law and with First Amendment protections.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cThe trend also threatens to jeopardize one of the United States\u2019 constitutional pillars: free speech.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n According to the UN experts, since the presidential election in November, US lawmakers in at least 19 states have introduced legislation \u201crestricting assembly rights by various degrees.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n This comes as the US has seen an unprecedented surge in mass protest movements, from Black Lives Matter demonstrations to mass protests against Trump\u2019s migration laws, environmental and Native American protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline, and the Women\u2019s Marches. The latter, for instance, was held across hundreds of cities and ended up as one of the largest demonstrations in US history, some estimates indicate<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIndividuals and organizations across society have mobilized in peaceful protests, as it is their right under international human rights law and US law. These state bills, with their criminalization of assemblies, enhanced penalties and general stigmatization of protesters, are designed to discourage the exercise of these fundamental rights,\u201d<\/em> the UN experts warned.<\/p>\n In their analysis, the UN experts pointed out a number of bills regarding \u201cunlawful obstruction of traffic\u201d<\/em> by protesters, for instance in Florida and Tennessee, where it has been proposed to exempt drivers from persecution if they accidentally hit and kill people demonstrating in the road.<\/p>\n Read more<\/p>\n A similar Indiana Senate bill could allow law enforcement to \u201cuse any means necessary\u201d<\/em> to clear the roads of demonstrators, while at least eight other states propose bills that would \u201cdisproportionately criminalize protestors for obstructing traffic,\u201d<\/em> like the one in Missouri, which sets a prison term of up to seven years for obstruction of traffic.<\/p>\n Kaye and Kiai mentioned that many of these bills target opponents of the Dakota Access Pipeline construction in North Dakota and could have \u201ca chilling effect on environmental protesters.\u201d<\/em> A little over a month ago, several dozen law enforcement officers in riot gear raided the protesters\u2019 camp near the site and arrested a number of people who had been camping there for months.<\/p>\n The experts also criticized the use of the word \u201cunlawful\u201d<\/em> regarding public assembly in the proposed legislation, as well as the term \u201cviolent,\u201d<\/em> which they deemed to be entirely inappropriate in the phrase \u201cviolent protest\u201d<\/em> \u2013 common for most of the bills.<\/p>\n \u201cThere can be no such thing in law as a violent protest. There are violent protesters, who should be dealt with individually and appropriately by law enforcement,\u201d<\/em> they said, noting that \u201cone person\u2019s decision to resort to violence does not strip other protesters of their right to freedom of peaceful assembly.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cThis right is not a collective right; it is held by each of us individually. Peaceful assembly is a fundamental right, not a privilege, and the government has no business imposing a general requirement that people get permission before exercising that right,\u201d<\/em> they explained.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Via RT<\/a>. This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" UN rights experts have voiced concerns over bills recently introduced by a number of US states aimed at restricting the right to assembly, saying they are \u201cundemocratic\u201d and violate international human rights obligations adopted by Washington. \u201cSince January 2017, a number of undemocratic bills have been proposed in state legislatures with the purpose or effect […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":301736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-301735","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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