A federal lawsuit filed in the United States District Court for Rhode Island late last month accuses Governor Daniel McKee and other top state officials of unconstitutionally suppressing free speech by preventing activists from holding a protest in the State House Rotunda. The complaint, brought by activists Harrison Tuttle and Eric Hirsch, along with the Rhode Island Homeless Advocacy Project (RIHAP), alleges that the governor’s administration engaged in a “transparent attempt to restrict speech that might appear to be critical of his administration.”

The lawsuit stems from a planned event on January 14, 2025, dubbed the “People’s State of the State.” Activists intended to gather in the State House Rotunda an hour before Governor McKee’s official State of the State address to highlight what they describe as “inaction and deficiencies by the McKee administration to address the housing crisis and homelessness in Rhode Island.”

According to the legal complaint, upon arriving at the State House, the protestors were met with an unexpected barrier. The Rotunda, a historically recognized public forum for expressive activities, had been cordoned off with signs and barriers. The filing alleges that the Governor’s office, having become aware of the planned protest, directed Capitol and State Police to “reserve” the Rotunda from 4:30 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. A calendar entry obtained through a public records request reportedly shows the space was formally reserved at 4:39 p.m. that same day.

Despite the reservation, the Rotunda remained vacant and unused except for the presence of law enforcement officers. The complaint states the reservation was a pretext, arguing the administration “never intended to use the Rotunda for any purpose… other than to silence any expressive activity, and particularly that of the Plaintiffs.”

The protestors, who included unhoused individuals and low-income community members, were forced to relocate to the Bell Room, a less visible and accessible area in the back of the State House. The complaint details how this relocation undermined Plaintiffs’ ability to convey their message and diminished the rally’s impact.

The alleged suppression did not end there. According to the filing, while protestors were barred from accessing the Rotunda and upper floors, other individuals were permitted free access. Plaintiff Harrison Tuttle, former President of Black Lives Matter RI PAC, was allegedly singled out. The complaint states that police informed Tuttle that the Governor’s office had specifically instructed them to prevent Tuttle from entering the Rotunda that evening and that officers, identified as John Does 1-10, later physically escorted and removed Plaintiff Tuttle from the second floor under threat of prosecution. When the protestors later marched peacefully on the first floor, they were again confronted by police, threatened with arrest, and blocked in a corridor out of sight of the press.

The lawsuit argues that these actions represent a clear violation of the citizens’ constitutional rights. It cites two primary legal violations. The first is a violation of the First Amendment, which protects freedom of speech, assembly, and the right to petition the government. The complaint asserts the state imposed an unconstitutional content-based and viewpoint-based restriction by targeting the protestors because of their critical message. It also claims the action was an illegal prior restraint – a form of government censorship that stops speech before it can even happen.

The second claim is a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, which requires the government to apply laws equally. The lawsuit argues that by blocking the protestors while allowing others to access the same areas, the state engaged in selective enforcement based on the content of their speech.

While the complaint focuses on the actions of Governor McKee’s Democratic administration, the incident echoes a larger, and for many, deeply concerning trend. The bedrock principles of the First Amendment have lately seemed under assault not just from the political right, but from an establishment left that often claims to be its champion. The aggressive, and at times violent, crackdowns on college campus protests against the war in Gaza under the Biden administration saw police in riot gear clearing encampments and arresting students and faculty. Civil liberties advocates from across the political spectrum decried these actions as a disproportionate suppression of political speech.

Simultaneously, the Biden administration faced years of legal challenges and accusations of attempting to censor online speech. The Supreme Court case Missouri v. Biden centered on allegations that federal officials coerced social media companies into removing or down-ranking content related to COVID-19 and election integrity, a practice critics labeled a form of jawboning censorship.

These events, from the alleged silencing of homeless advocates in the halls of the Rhode Island State House to the confrontations on college quads and the battles over social media content, paint a troubling picture for the Democratic Party as the Trump administration moves to eliminate much of the 1st Amendment entirely. They suggest the impulse to control the narrative and suppress dissent is not a partisan affliction, but a temptation inherent in power itself. The lawsuit against Governor McKee serves as another critical test of whether the people’s right to challenge their government will be protected, regardless of who sits in the seat of power.

The plaintiffs are asking the court for a declaratory judgment that their rights were violated, a permanent injunction to prevent the administration from using similar tactics in the future, and damages against the individual officers involved.