Ind. ‘Buffer Law’ Doesn’t Regulate First Amendment Press Activity, Says AG

The purpose of HB-1186, Indiana’s “buffer law,” is “strikingly clear” in preventing interference with police duties, said Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita’s (R) opposition Friday (docket 1:23-cv-01805) in U.S. District Court for Southern Indiana in Indianapolis to the Nov. 3 motion of seven media organizations for a preliminary injunction to block Rokita from enforcing the statute (see 2311060046). HB-1186, which took effect July 1, makes it a misdemeanor for journalists to come within 25 feet of police officers on active duty, but the law’s substance can’t “reasonably be said to address anything other than such interference,” said Rokita’s opposition. Because the buffer law doesn’t regulate First Amendment activity, “it passes all levels of scrutiny,” it said. Its actual enforcement “shows no anti-press application,” it said. It has never been enforced against the plaintiffs, “who complain only of the long-used media staging areas” and of law enforcement’s “common-law discretion in requiring space when necessary,” it said. “Even if their speculation that the law is their woes’ cause did have merit, the facts show those woes are not First Amendment-related,” it said.