American Civil Liberties Union

Police in Tampa used smartphones and tablets to spy on protesters at the Republican National Convention, according to a report today from the National Journal.

Smartphones have proven to be an excellent tool for empowering individuals faced with sometimes unprofessional or abusive law enforcement officers, thanks to their built-in cameras and the constitutional right to record the police. But they also allow the police, according to the article, to blend in and transmit live video of protesters:

Just shy of the one-year anniversary of the inaugural Occupy Wall Street protests, the ACLU of Northern California obtained initial documents from the FBI about surveillance of Occupy demonstrations in the region (see the FBI’s response here).

The documents came after an ACLU-NC lawsuit filed after the FBI refused to release any documents in a Freedom of Information Act request. The documents are significant for two reasons:

The second coming of the “Stolen Valor” Act (the Supreme Court struck down the first iteration on First Amendment grounds last term) is on the House’s “suspension” calendar today, meaning it will pass with a two-thirds majority vote, without amendment and after 40 minutes of debate.  The bill would create additional federal penalties for “fraudulent” representations concerning military decorations.

Earlier this week, we told you about your RNC-related rights, and now we’ve pulled together similar resources specific to the Democratic National Convention.

As we mentioned before, while the First Amendment protects our rights to free speech and assembly, police and government officials are allowed to place certain nondiscriminatory and narrowly drawn "time, place and manner" restrictions on the exercise of First Amendment rights. These restrictions must apply to all speech regardless of its point of view, but this does mean that how these rights manifest themselves do vary from state to state and city to city.