A Florida Panhandle lawmaker has filed the “Right to Rock Act,” for the 2024 session of the Legislature.
Rep. Joel Rudman, R-Navarre, wants to prohibit the cancellation of performances because of an artist’s social media comments or their political affiliation.
HB 15 would forbid entertainment venues that have accepted taxpayer funding to cancel contracts for a live presentation by a singer, musicians, dancers, comedians, and actors for their social media behavior and/or politics.
Rudman is a Mississippi born physician who became politically active during the COVID-19 pandemic. He took to Facebook Live presentations to argue against masks and other government mandates, and testified before legislative committees on behalf of a proposal to protect practitioners’ speech.
“I didn’t go into politics; politics went into medicine,” Rudman told the Pensacola News Journal when he announced his campaign for the state house in 2022.
Rudman won the GOP 2022 primary for an open seat with 16,000 votes, faced no Democratic opposition, and is a candidate for re-election next year.
Earlier this month he invited constituents to a rock’n’roll town hall meeting. After an an hour-long question and answer session on Florida politics he whipped out a guitar and performed a 17-song setlist of KISS, AC/DC and Led Zeppelin classics.
“I’m the liberty guy. I’m the freedom guy. It’s not just my freedom of speech that I’m worried about as a doctor. It’s the freedom of speech of everyone,” Rudman told Midbaynews, a hyperlocal news site for Eglin Air Force Base and surrounding communities, when he promoted the event.
Earlier this year, Rudman sponsored the House version of SB 1580, a protections of medical conscience act. It allows health care providers to invoke “conscience-based objections” to decline participation in the delivery of health care services.
James Call is a member of the USA TODAY NETWORK-Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at jcall@tallahassee.com. Follow on him Twitter: @CallTallahassee