Cleveland City Council’s public comment policy under fire after cutting resident microphones
ideastream: Andrew Geronimo, director of the First Amendment Clinic at the School of Law, said according to the U.S. Supreme Court, if a government body allows a public forum, citizens must be guaranteed full First Amendment rights. Those protections extend to bigoted speech, he added. “Criticism of government, like petitioning government for redress of grievances is directly in the First Amendment,” Geronimo said. “They’re not obligated to maintain this forum, but once they do, they can’t say you’re not allowed to criticize us in this forum.”