WMC Has Exceeded Their Authority

Update on WMC v. Wilkinson

Hello SMF’ers! Silent Majority Foundation has filed a response in our Wilkinson v WMC case. Similar to our other medical freedom cases, this case really comes down to the protection of free speech, a Constitutionally-guaranteed right of the People. Physicians are not excluded from this foundational right, and the actions of the Washington Medical Commission are a direct attack on Dr. Wilkinson’s right to free speech as well as his patients’ right to receive speech. Attorney Karen Osborne is leading this case, and she did a fantastic job with this response! We have included the filing below and will lay out some interesting facts and issues brought up by our legal team.

Key Issues Presented

• Does the Commission have the authority to regulate Dr. Wilkinson’s speech pursuant to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution?

• Does RCW 18.130.160 authorize the Commission to order an open-ended physical, cognitive and psychological examination as a disciplinary measure?

• Did the Commission retaliate against Dr. Wilkinson for his speech?

These are substantive questions that we answer clearly in our response. The Washington Medical Commission does not have the power to regulate Dr. Wilkinson’s speech as any order by an Agency is interpreted as a whole to apply the intent of the agency as decided in City of Vancouver v. State Pub. Employment Relations Comm’n, 180 Wn. App. 333, 325 P.3d 213 (2014). We argue that the intent of the WMC’s Order against Dr. Wilkinson is to regulate speech and enforce the WMC’s COVID-19 Misinformation Position Statement. The regulation of speech occurred under the guise of regulating “the practice of medicine,” but it remains a clear violation of Dr. Wilkinson’s First Amendment rights, which the WMC cannot regulate.

What has past case-law had to say about the illegal regulation of speech?

• “Every person may freely speak, write, and publish on all subjects, being responsible for the abuse of that right. [Const. art. 1, § 5.] However, the “[s]uppression of speech as an effective police measure is an old, old device, outlawed by our Constitution.” Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 705, 712 (1969).

• “As a general matter, [content-based] laws are presumptively unconstitutional and may be justified only if the government proves that they are narrowly tailored to serve compelling state interests.” National Inst of Family & Life Advocates v. Becerra (NIFLA), 138 S. Ct. 2361, 2371, 201 L. Ed. 2d 835 (2018); Sheehan v. Gregoire, No. C02-1112C, at *18 (W.D. Wash. May 22, 2003)

• “…the First Amendment precludes the government from proscribing (denouncing) speech because it disapproves of the ideas expressed.” R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul,

  505 U.S. 377, 382 (1992)

• “The First Amendment deprives the states of unfettered power to reduce a group’s First Amendment rights by simply imposing a licensing

  requirement.” NIFLA, 138 S. Ct. at 2375.

• “…a doctor who publicly advocates a treatment that the medical establishment considers outside the mainstream, or even dangerous, is entitled to robust protection under the First Amendment—just as any person is— even though the state has the power to regulate medicine.” Pickup, 740 F.3d at 1227.

The Washington Medical Commission clearly attempts to equate speech with the conduct, by claiming it is the practice of medicine, calling it: “verbal conduct that posed a serious threat to the public health and safety and sowed further public distrust of physicians in Washington State.” Dr. Wilkinson’s blogs do not constitute the act of therapy/treatment, and no amount of fact finding as to its truthfulness or reliability can change this conclusion. This brings us back to a question we asked previously: Shouldn’t the science behind the WMC’s policies withstand the testing of that science? It’s hard to uphold the “science” behind such mandates as the “6 feet apart rule” when Mr. Fauci has admitted the conjecture of these “rules” forced on us. Dr. Wilkinson did what any physician should do - he tested the science.

The investigation into Dr. Wilkinson’s speech has several issues:

• Regulation of “misinformation” and “disinformation” is also, by its very nature, arbitrary and capricious, as the terms are defined by the WMC, who retains regulatory/punitive authority in determining what is defined as a violation of the Position Statement. The WMC has attempted to give itself judge, jury and executioner status - an authority it does not hold.

• With the roll out of the WMC’s COVID-19 Misinformation Position Statement, there were new instructions provided to the investigators as testified to by one of the WMC’s Investigators. These new instructions included the capturing of “blog and/or website content, as well as the following up on hyperlinks” for the intent of regulating and punishing what is deemed “misinformation and disinformation.”

• The policy was used to target Dr. Wilkinson’s speech based solely on the content of his speech. The WMC cannot enforce the violating of speech simply because it does not agree with said speech. That’s not how it works.

• The WMC Position Statement “encouraged” doctors and the public to lodge complaints against doctors who offered statements contrary to the Commission’s Position Statement.

This case has many facets that are very similar to what Dr. Turner, Dr. Ryan Cole, and Dr. Renata Moon have endured at the hands of the WMC. The WMC has no authority regulate speech, retaliate against speech or require physical, cognitive, and psychological examination as a form of discipline for speech it disagrees with.

40061 1 Petitioner Reply Filed

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The systematic chilling of free speech is rampant throughout our nation. The ramifications of allowing an Agency to punish doctors for exercising their Constitutionally guaranteed rights are terrifying. We the People cannot enjoy medical freedom when physicians are only “allowed” to share an approved narrative.

Support your physicians who do what they are supposed to – independent research that leads to an informed opinion, independent of the government’s preferred narrative! Every donation to our Medical Freedom Fund allows us to continue to stand with courageous Physicians who take their oath to “do no harm” seriously and have exercised their right to speak freely in order to provide information to We the People. Help us keep putting the pressure on the WMC. Thank you!