This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, November 8th, 2019. I'm Caleb Brown.

When citizen activist Ron Calzone approached lawmakers in his home state of Missouri to share his

perspective and air redressable grievances. The state told him to

register as a lobbyist. But Ron Calzone doesn't get paid by anyone to do this activism, so

the Institute for Free Speech took up his case. This week the

Eighth Circuit US Court of Appeals agreed with Ron.

Zach Morgan, an attorney at the Institute for Free Speech, details the case.

You can't make this name up. Tell me about Ron Calzone.

Ron Calzone is an incredible citizen activist in Missouri.

Ron is one of the most passionate, most engaged people I've ever had the privilege of knowing.

Ron has his own volition on his own dime, nobody directs him to, nobody tells him to.

He doesn't use financial power to manipulate the system.

But he goes to Jefferson City, he testifies on legislative committees on legislation, He speaks one-on-one with

legislators. He's the only person I know who is when a pro se lawsuit against a

state government, arguing the state government violated their own constitution and how they promulgated legislation.

And in the course of all of this volunteer activity that Ron did in Missouri, he made a few enemies,

which is one of the reasons why I'm here today.

So a three-judge panel of the Eighth Circuit US Court of Appeals said this guy is a lobbyist. Yeah. Back in November. That's correct. Yeah. This has been a long running thing in Missouri. This started in 2014 in November because Ron's

activism upset a number of figures in Jefferson City who I guess you could you could call the Republican establishment to the extent that exists exists there

and they secretly went to this entity called the the Missouri Society of Governmental Consultants,

which is the Lobbyist Guild for Professional Lobbyists.

It's the professional organization for professional lobbyists

...