2.

Findings

The Congress finds the following:

(1) The freedom of speech and the press is enshrined in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

(2) Free speech, the free exchange of information, and the free expression of ideas and opinions are essential to the functioning of representative democracy in the United States.

(3) The free expression and publication by journalists, academics, commentators, experts, and others of the information they uncover and develop through research and study is essential to the formation of sound public policy and thus to the security of Americans.

(4) The First Amendment jurisprudence of the Supreme Court, articulated in such precedents as New York Times v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964), and its progeny, reflects the fundamental value that Americans place on promoting the free exchange of ideas and information, requiring in cases involving public figures a demonstration of actual malice—that is, that allegedly defamatory, libelous, or slanderous statements about public figures are not merely false but made with knowledge of that falsity or with reckless disregard of their truth or falsity.

(5) Some persons are obstructing the free expression rights of Americans, and the vital interest of the American people in receiving information on matters of public importance, by first seeking out foreign jurisdictions that do not provide the full extent of free-speech protection that is fundamental in the United States and then suing Americans in such jurisdictions in defamation actions based on speech uttered or published in the United States—speech that is fully protected under First Amendment jurisprudence in the United States and the laws of the several States and the District of Columbia.

(6) Some of these actions are intended not only to suppress the free speech rights of journalists, academics, commentators, experts, and other individuals but to intimidate publishers and other organizations that might otherwise disseminate or support the work of those individuals with the threat of prohibitive foreign lawsuits, litigation expenses, and judgments that provide for money damages and other speech-suppressing relief.

(7) The governments and courts of some foreign countries have failed to curtail this practice, permitting lawsuits filed by persons who are often not citizens of those countries, under circumstances where there is often little or no basis for jurisdiction over the Americans against whom such suits are brought.

(8) Some of the plaintiffs bringing such suits are intentionally and strategically refraining from filing their suits in the United States, even though the speech at issue was published in the United States, in order to avoid the Supreme Court’s First Amendment jurisprudence and frustrate the protections it affords Americans.

(9) The Americans against whom such suits are brought must consequently endure the prohibitive expense, inconvenience, and anxiety attendant to being sued in foreign courts for conduct that is protected by the First Amendment, or decline to answer such suits and risk the entry of costly default judgments that may be executed in countries other than the United States where those individuals travel or own property.

(10) Journalists, academics, commentators, experts, and others subjected to such suits are suffering concrete and profound financial and professional damage for engaging in conduct that is protected under the United States Constitution and essential to informing the American people, their representatives, and other policy-makers.

(11) In turn, the American people are suffering concrete and profound harm because they, their representatives, and other government policymakers rely on the free expression of information, ideas, and opinions developed by responsible journalists, academics, commentators, experts, and others for the formulation of sound public policy, including national security policy.