Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Shaft of sunlight penetrates shield law clouds as House bucks Senate version of HB622
by Larry Geller
Civil Beat wrote:
A floor amendment introduced by Majority Leader Scott Saiki calls for extending the current 1st Amendment protections for journalists for two years. It rejects the amended version of House Bill 622 that many critics said would severely weaken the shield law, in no small part because bloggers and free print media would not be covered.
[Civil Beat, Hawaii House Votes To Restore Shield Law, 4/30/2013]
The House has done the right thing. Now, will the Senate buck “politically powerful senator” Clayton Hee and accept the House bill as written?
Thanks to Civil Beat for promptly posting and tweeting this news.
Now the rest of us, if we want to see Hawaii’s shield law extended (it was considered a model for other states), can take action to contact our Senators and ask them to vote in favor of accepting the House version on Thursday.
Civil Beat reporter Nathan Eagle wrote about the shield law and the problems with the Senate version in his article, Hawaii Media Still Unhappy With Latest Version of Shield Law (Civil Beat, 4/22/2013).
I can guess why Sen. Hee cut alternative media out of his version of the shield law (just click on my link after the snip).
If you would like to express your opinions to all senators, they can be reached at email sens@capitol.hawaii.gov. Or call your own Senator and ask that they vote for continuing the existing shield law when it comes up on Thursday. That’s HB622.
Keep Hawaii’s media free.
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