The Office of the President and other White House officials are defendants in a free speech lawsuit filed by a prominent physician group, and a non-profit advocate for inner-city poor.
The White House has "unlawfully collected information on political speech," thereby illegally using the power of the White House to chill opposition to its plans for health care reform, according to the complaint filed in District Court for the District of Columbia, by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) and the Coalition for Urban Renewal and Education (CURE)
The lawsuit was prompted by the White House solicitation for the public to report any "fishy" comments to 'flag@whitehouse.gov.' Although the White House slightly revised its data collection procedure last week, the email address still exists, the illegal activity continues, and is part of an "unlawful pattern and practice to collect and maintain information" on the exercise of free speech, which "continues in violation of the Privacy Act and First Amendment even if the Defendants terminate a particular information-collection component due to negative publicity."
The lawsuit outlines how the White House has employed a form of "bait-and-switch" tactic of accusing the Plaintiffs and other opponents of spreading misinformation about the Administration's goals for health care reform, and thereby refusing to 'come clean' about its real agenda.
The lawsuit outlines that the White House knew that the data collection would chill free speech, and in fact, intended to do just that: