In a new article, UNLV law professor Michael Kagan argues that the Supreme Court has sent mixed signals about whether undocumented immigrants can claim protection under the First Amendment. The election of a president who is both strongly anti-immigrant and intolerant of dissent could thus generate a constitutional crisis.
Surprisingly, Prof. Kagan argues that a part of the Supreme Court’s controversial decision in Citizens United may offer an essential weapon that immigrant activists could use to defense their free expression, because that decision opposed identify-based speech restrictions. But that idea was rejected by the liberal justices on the Supreme Court. The potential threat of Trump Administration should cause liberals to rethink that.
