Updating Javed Iqbal's Arrest

Javed Iqbal was arrested for rebroadcasting HizbullahTv (aka al Manar) from his home and business New York City. Glenn Reynolds thinks that there might be a persuasive case under the First Amendment in support of Iqban that the IEEPA is unconstitutional as applied to free speech in this instance:

Personally, I'd favor exempting retransmission of news material, etc., from the statute, and I think there's a pretty good argument that this sort of prosecution violates the First Amendment. But it's also true that sweeping powers of this sort are nothing new in the field of international trade.

That doesn't necessarily mean that Iqban would win on those grounds, only that there are serious legal questions involved.

As the SI Advance notes:

Authorities charged Javed Iqbal with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Protection Act — which is designed to prevent terrorist groups from conducting business by blocking transactions and freezing assets — after federal agents executed search warrants at two storefronts in Brooklyn and Iqbal’s Mariners Harbor home. If convicted, he could spend up to five years in prison.

At least eight satellite dishes — some of them several feet tall — were visible behind a white garage in back of Iqbal’s nondescript house on Van Name Avenue yesterday. A surveillance camera hung from the second story of Iqbal’s house, aimed at the front door and the adjacent sidewalk.

Stop the ACLU isn't surprised to see the ACLU apparently siding with Iqbal. Neither am I.

Ranting Profs also considers the ramifications of the prosecution as a potential violation of free speech and discounts the ACLU's statements on the matter because they've lost any claims of objectivity on such matters.

As I noted yesterday, no one has to go through the trouble of obtaining these Hizbullah/Jihadi broadcasts from a satellite or cable provider when they can just as easily obtain the webcasts online.