An UNMUTED Dialogue: Citizens Divided
About this Event
DOORS OPEN AT 6:30, SHOW STARTS AT 7
Money in Politics, baby!
Everyone agrees money runs American politics. The disagreement is whether that's a feature or a disease.
In 2010, Citizens United v. FEC held that the government can't ban corporations, unions, or nonprofits from spending money on political speech. The First Amendment, the Court said, doesn't get weaker because the speaker is an organization rather than a person. Fifteen years later, it remains one of the most loved and most loathed decisions in modern constitutional law.
For its defenders, the case is a straightforward win for free speech. Political speech is the most protected speech there is, and spending money to spread a message is part of how speech actually reaches people. Let the government decide who's allowed to spend on politics, the argument goes, and you've handed incumbents a tool to silence their critics. The answer to speech you dislike is more speech, not a federal permission slip.
For its critics, the case broke American democracy. It opened the floodgates to super PACs and unlimited outside money, and turned elections into auctions where a few hundred families and corporations drown out everyone else. When a sliver of the wealthiest Americans funds the campaigns, candidates listen to them, not to you. That isn't free speech, the argument goes. It's legalized corruption wearing the First Amendment as a costume.
One question every voter feels in a democracy that increasingly answers to its donors.
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. He previously ran the Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, and has filed more than 500 Supreme Court amicus briefs over his career. The author of Lawless: The Miseducation of America's Elites and Supreme Disorder, he's one of the country's most prominent free-speech-first voices on constitutional law. If you want the case that Citizens United got the First Amendment exactly right, he's your guy.
Lawrence Lessig is the Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School and the founder of Equal Citizens. A former Scalia and Posner clerk who turned from copyright law to the fight against money in politics, he wrote Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress and ran a 2016 presidential campaign built entirely around the issue. He has testified before the Senate against Citizens United and the rise of super PACs, and is currently litigating to push the Court to revisit it. If you want the case that Citizens United corrupted American democracy, he's the person to ask.
UNMUTED is a discussion forum for the politically curious. Humor. Tension. Social. Open-minded is the name of the game. Join your people.
Agenda
🕑: 06:30 PM - 07:00 PM
Doors Open
🕑: 07:00 PM - 07:30 PM
MC Comedy and Moderated Debate
Info: Our MC introduces the topic over a HILARIOUS (our opinion) five minute set. Then she introduces the moderator, and our two speakers, who debate the issue over 20-25 minutes.
🕑: 07:30 PM - 08:00 PM
Competitive Q&A
Info: Your interactive portion. Team up with 4-5 people to come up with MOST unique, MOST disruptive, MOST thought provoking question for the debaters. After 15 minutes of deliberation, the moderator will pick the best 3 questions, the debaters will answer those. By show of hands or screams, the audience will then vote on the best question of all. The team with the best question wins a mystery, and relevant, prize.
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
USD 25.00 to USD 65.87
