Add The California Post on Google The “Stop Nick Shirley Act” is California’s latest assault on the First Amendment.
Of course, Gavin Newsom, Mia Bonta, and the Democrats describe AB 2624 as a way to protect the “privacy” of “immigration support service providers.”
The media have largely played along, describing the bill as a way to protect immigrants.
But that’s not what the bill is, nor what motivated it.
The bill is an attempt to protect the non-profit organizations from scrutiny by journalists who are asking questions the state itself should be asking about potential fraud.
Citizen journalist Nick Shirley visited several sites in Minnesota and drew attention to fraud committed by organizations within the Somali community there.
The problem was real, and well-known, but Minnesota Governor Tim Walz tried to cover it up, and accused critics of racism.
Shirley came to California to conduct more investigative journalism about mismanagement, grift, and fraud, just as The California Post has been doing.
That’s when Democrats in Sacramento decided to act.
AB 2624 would “prohibit a person, business, or association from soliciting, selling, or trading on the internet the personal information or image of a designated immigration support services provider, employee, or volunteer” with the intent of “that another person imminently use that information to commit a crime involving violence or a threat of violence.”
Inciting violence is already illegal. But AB 2624 suggests that if a journalist like Nick Shirley exposes fraud committed by an organization serving immigrants (which, in “sanctuary state” California, includes illegal immigrants), and someone else decides — illegally — to threaten that organization, then the journalist has committed a crime.
That is a violation of the First Amendment, and it will not stand up in court. It is just pandering to the amnesty lobby.
The California Post faces the same danger from this new law as citizen journalist like Nick Shirley does.
It aims to discourage reporting on non-profits — like our recent report on a non-profit CEO who is raking in millions.
Gavin Newsom styles himself as a defender of the First Amendment when he criticizes President Donald Trump, or Republicans who ban pornography from school libraries in other states.
But he has a track record of signing bills that violate free speech and are later struck down by the courts.
The most laughable example was in 2024, when he signed a law banning the use of AI in political ads.
That law was intended to protect Kamala Harris from mockery. It was tossed out the moment it hit a federal court.
And who could forget the prosecution of David Daleiden — later dropped — for the crime of undercover journalism exposing Planned Parenthood?
Journalists deserve protection, not intimidation. The “Stop Nick Shirley Act” is a disgrace.
