Broadcast, PACER access all the more important given broad interest in Ninth Circuit’s recent travel ban case

The House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Courts, IP and the Internet will hold a hearing examining judicial transparency and ethics at 10:00 a.m. ET on Tuesday, February 14, in Rayburn 2141. Topics will include improving broadcast access to the federal courts system, including the U.S. Supreme Court; whether federal judges and justices should be required to modernize their ethics protocols; and ways to improve public access to court electronic records, known as the PACER system.

Witnesses will include:

– Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association; expert in First Amendment law and audio/video recording of court proceedings

– Charles Geyh, John F. Kimberling Professor of Law at Indiana University Maurer School of Law; expert in judicial ethics (op-ed on SCOTUS ethics here) and former HJC counsel

– Thomas Bruce, co-founder and director of the Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School and renowned scholar on legal information modernization

Fix the Court executive director Gabe Roth said: “After Tuesday’s livestream of the Ninth Circuit’s travel ban case, a lot of Americans have been asking, why doesn’t the Supreme Court offer similar access? (There is no good answer.) I want to thank Subcommittee Chairman Issa and Ranking Member Nadler for calling a hearing dedicated to court transparency and accountability issues, and I’m hopeful the Senate Judiciary Committee raises similar issues in their forthcoming hearing with Judge Gorsuch.”

If C-SPAN chooses to cover the hearing live, Fix the Court will sent out a link as soon as it becomes available.