The Arizona Supreme Court launched a Task Force on Countering Disinformation in 2019 that is raising concerns. It is the first state court system in the country to establish one. The task force has issued two reports with recommendations since its launch.
The task force members include some partisans, and none of them appear to be conservative.
One of them is Scott Ruston, a research professor who directs Arizona State University (ASU)’s Center on Narrative, Disinformation, and Strategic Influence. His background includes applying his expertise to “counter violent extremism and counter violent extremist ideology research contexts, including: analysis of extremist narratives.”
“If the courts aren’t saying what’s happening and explaining why judges make rulings in particular ways, then that’s fertile ground for people to basically lie about it and make claims that are untrue,” Ruston told The Arizona Capitol Times about the task force in February 2021. “And not only are they untrue, but they are malicious.”
The article said Ruston (pictured above, left) concluded that “disinformation actors seek out social wedge issues around which they can erode the public’s faith in political institutions, whether that’s the judiciary, the legislature, the education system, the press or the executive branch.”
Read the rest of the article at The Arizona Sun Times