Blog of Rights
Gabe
Rottman

Gabe Rottman is a legislative counsel/policy advisor in the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office, focusing on the First Amendment. Gabe served as an attorney in private practice before coming back to the ACLU. Prior to law school, Gabe worked in the WLO as a senior writer and communications specialist. Gabe has a J.D. magna cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center, where he was a notes editor of the Georgetown Law Journal, and a B.A. from McGill University in political science and history, where he was on the dean’s honors list.

04/26/2012
H.R. 347

Ready to Occupy? What You Need to Know about H.R. 347, the "Criminalizing Protest" Law

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 11:35am

Occupy, NATO and the party conventions are all coming up this year. Know your rights under the newly signed protest law.

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04/24/2012
Video Games

The Freedom to Game

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 1:17pm

In 1954, German-American psychiatrist Fredric Wertham published the now infamous Seduction of the Innocent, a book chronicling the supposed harm caused to America's youth by comic books. Wertham's book prompted a wave of hand-wringing around the nation.

Now, we're seeing a new round of the same hysteria directed at video games — old wine in new digital bottles. And, the history of comic book censorship is directly relevant for the contemporary debate over "violent video games."

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04/11/2012
Freedom of Association

That's a Good Question?!

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 7:51pm

So, Rep. Allen West—Republican from 1955—is apparently trying to single-handedly refight the Cold War. At an event today, somebody asked the Florida lawmaker how many members of Congress are “card-carrying Marxists.” His answer: “[n]o, it’s a good question. I believe there is about 78 to 81 members of the Democratic Party that are members of the Communist Party. . . . It’s called the Congressional Progressive Caucus.”

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03/29/2012
Freedom of Expression

Hoodies and Congressional Expression

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 5:04pm

It was hard to miss on TV or online yesterday the spectacle of Democratic Congressman Bobby Rush of Chicago being ejected from the House floor for wearing a hooded sweatshirt.

After taking off his jacket and raising the hood over his head during a speech in tribute to Florida shooting victim Trayvon Martin, the presiding officer instructed the Sergeant-at-Arms to give Rush the boot, ostensibly to enforce the House rules on decorum. Now we all know you can’t wear hats while Congress is in session.

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03/26/2012
Video Games

Bill Proposes Labeling Video Games Like Cigarettes

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 2:57pm

Representatives Joe Baca (D-CA) and Frank Wolf (R-VA) introduced a deceptively simple bill last week that is totally unnecessary, potentially very harmful to Americans’ First Amendment rights and needlessly tries to play parent for millions of American kids.

The bill, designated H.R. 4204, would require every video game with a rating above “E-for-Everyone” from the Electronic Software Rating Board (or “ESRB”) to carry the ominous, tobacco-style admonition: “WARNING: Exposure to violent video games has been linked to aggressive behavior.” 

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03/08/2012
H.R. 347

How Big a Deal is H.R. 347, That “Criminalizing Protest” Bill?

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 11:56am

Recent days have seen significant concern about an unassuming bill with an unassuming name: the "Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011." The bill, H.R. 347, has been variously described as making the First Amendment illegal or criminalizing the Occupy protests.

The truth is more mundane, but the issues raised are still of major significance for the First Amendment.

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09/11/2007
Detention

Cross-Post

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 1:02pm
Sorry I haven't been posting more. Have been busy with other stuff (but check out this post on the ACLU blog). Also, thanks so much to Naomi Klein, the inimitable author of No Logo and the forthcoming The Shock Doctrine, for linking to findhabeas! Big ups to the Canadians.
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09/10/2007

Spying on Your Circle of Friends

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 3:43pm
The New York Times reported Sunday that the FBI had consistently used judgeless subpoenas, called National Security Letters, to investigate Americans in the "community of interest" of the bureau's actual target.

That's a mouthful, but basically it means they fixated on one dude and then
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09/07/2007
Detention

Mr. Addington Gets Called Out

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 12:10pm
When the historians get their mitts on the Bush presidency, the one essential book that probably will never be written is a biography of David Addington, Vice President Cheney's former top lawyer and current chief of staff (the replacement, of course, for Scooter). Of all of the executive supremacy guys, Mr. Addington is the most prodigious, the most zeal
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09/05/2007

FISA Needs Following, Not Modernizing

By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 5:07pm
It's not always easy crystallizing the civil liberties message to a broad audience. I mean, let's face it, there's a big leap between selling SUVs and the Fourth Amendment.

But in the lead-up to Congress' return and today's House Judiciary Committee hearing on FISA, own version of the glitzy, high-def car commercial is kicking up some Capitol dust.

In the ads, Read More»
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