Podcasts: Winter Institute ABFE Sessions
The recordings of the American Booksellers for Free Expression (ABFE) Winter Institute sessions are now available on the BookED podcast:
Legislative Updates:
Thank you to the booksellers who spoke out against Texas HB 1375, which would create pathways for frivolous lawsuits targeting bookstores for curation of books! They waited over 12 hours to testify, and perfectly explained how the bill would threaten indie booksellers. Legislators have promised to amend the bill, and we will keep careful watch to make sure that happens.
North Dakota: THANK YOU to Governor Kelly Armstrong for vetoing SB 2307, a book ban bill that represented significant state overreach and impingement into the rights of parents and communities. The legislature failed to override the veto.
Texas:
- Librarian criminalization bills HB 267 and SB 412 are poised to pass, removing liability exemptions for librarians related to their curation. Write your legislators today to let them know you oppose these bills.
- Similarly, HB 3225 and SB 2101 are linked bills that would target public libraries, forcing them to create adults-only sections for anything containing sexual conduct, regardless of context, purpose, or the literary merit of the work as a whole. As we saw in Idaho with HB 710, this kind of approach leads libraries to make it harder for kids to use the library based on a false narrative about library books. Write your legislators about HB 3225 and SB 2101, and let them know you oppose these bills.
South Carolina: HB 4123 would weaken First Amendment protections for books by targeting the constitutional need to consider the “merit of the work taken as a whole,” allowing only scientific merit to be considered. This unconstitutional bill would drastically increase the number of books banned and impact booksellers directly. It was heard in a Judiciary Committee subcommittee meeting today, but only about five minutes of testimony were taken. You can write to the committee through the ACLU of South Carolina page and watch this space for more information about additional opportunities to testify. (Note: the ACLU page emphasizes educators and librarians, but this bill would impact everyone.)