Last minute challenges to new executive order on immigration mount, including charges that the order violates First Amendment by amounting to a Muslim ban by another name. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson allows a lone reporter from a little known conservative online media outlet aboard his plane to Asia. Rachel Maddow hypes supposed Trump tax disclosure amounting to just a few pages from 2005, which the White House then confirms while continuing to refuse to disclose the president’s full returns. -Suzanne Nossel, Executive Director

DARE: Daily Alert on Rights and Expression

PEN America’s take on today’s most pressing threats to free expression

U.S.

Trump travel ban: opposition rallies as new order set to take effect
Lawyers and anti-Trump protesters are preparing for renewed confrontation at US airports over the president’s revised travel ban on visitors from six majority-Muslim countries that is scheduled to come into effect at midnight.
THE GUARDIAN

Small Conservative Outlet Lands The Only Press Spot On Tillerson’s Plane To Asia
Erin McPike, the White House correspondent for the Independent Journal Review, a small conservative outlet, was the only journalist to have a seat on the trip. The State Department had said that it was planning on taking a smaller plane.
BUZZFEED

Advocates say First Amendment can withstand recent attacks
First Amendment advocates call the Trump administration the most hostile to the press and free expression in memory. But free speech advocates say the press, at least on legal issues, is well positioned to withstand Trump.
ASSOCIATED PRESS

Rachel Maddow Lands a Scoop, Then Makes Viewers Wait
Rachel Maddow had a big scoop, and she handled it her way. While many journalists criticized her for waiting to reveal what was in the Trump tax returns, it was of a piece with the strategy Ms. Maddow has laid out for herself and her staff.
THE NEW YORK TIMES

The Epic of Donald Trump
The $54 billion heading towards the Pentagon is a beautiful thing. Hopefully, when the Pentagon consider what to do with that money, they will stop and think about the value of the arts and literature to our national defense.
THE WASHINGTON POST

 
Global

Beauty and the Beast: Disney rules out censoring gay scene for Malaysia
The live-action film had been due to open in Malaysia on Thursday but the release is now in question. The film has offended social conservatives for making LeFou, sidekick to villain Gaston, the first openly gay character in a Disney film.
BBC

Japan Foundation slammed for allowing ‘censorship’ at art exhibition
When Sabah art collective Pangrok Sulap’s artwork was removed from an exhibition two days after its opening, many in the arts scene gave the organizer a chance explain themselves. But it’s now been a month with no explanation.
MALAY MAIL

Facebook and Twitter Could Face Fines in Germany Over Hate Speech Posts
Social media giants including Facebook and Twitter are not doing enough to curb hate speech on their platforms and could face fines of up to $53 million if they do not strengthen their efforts to delete illegal posts, says a German government minister.
THE NEW YORK TIMES

Netanyahu takes journalist to court for ‘libel’
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara made a court appearance on Tuesday, where they pressed a libel suit against a prominent Israeli journalist who claimed that the premier’s wife kicked him out of a car on a major highway.
WORLD ISRAEL NEWS

Ban on Head Scarves at Work Is Legal, E.U. Court Rules
The European Union’s highest court waded into the politically explosive issue of public expressions of Muslim identity on Tuesday, finding that private employers can ban female workers from wearing head scarves on the job.
THE NEW YORK TIMES

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