Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the inimitable Flaxen Klaxon, has gotten her Mussolini Underoos in a twist again because someone rode by her on a bicycle and called her a fascist. She didn’t delve into the lurid details, but if it wasn’t either an early-20th century gadabout hieing to his local publick house on a penny-farthing or a 4-year-old girl riding her Big Wheel to her local Build-A-Bear Workshop, the universe needs to step up its game just a bit.
MTG is M-A-D because U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who’s presiding over Donald Trump’s attempted democracy-murder trial, imposed a limited gag order on the defendant that forces him to behave like a civilized person in a civilized society—something that everyone, including Greene, knows is literally impossible.
Greene, who took an oath to the Constitution that may as well have been a vow to a cheese-pocked Quarter Pounder wrapper, thinks the gag order is a violation of Trump’s free speech rights. Because how is an obviously guilty man supposed to get a fair trial if he can’t summon a feral mob of hooligans to threaten the lives of judges, prosecutors, and potential jurors? Is this still America or what?
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Watch:
GREENE: “You want to know what’s dangerous? They have called President Trump Hitler and called him Nazi. They’ve called me Nazi. Someone drove by their bicycle today outside the courtroom and called me a fascist. They call us names all the time. Why isn’t their speech being gagged? Why isn’t their speech being censored? Why isn’t their speech being weighed in the public court of opinion and weighed in courtrooms as being disparaging and inflammatory and inciting violence against people?”
Yes, it’s very rude to call someone a fascist just because they tried to overturn a free and fair election in order to install an unaccountable strongman dictator. It’s like words don’t even mean anything anymore!
Of course, Trump is still allowed to claim he’s being politically persecuted, or that he ran for president against Barack Obama, or that windmills are driving whales so “batty” that they also think they ran against Barack Obama. He just can’t—as a felony defendant—use his bully pulpit to make the folks administering justice in his case feel threatened. In other words, it’s the same standard that applies to any American who’s done (allegedly!) illegal things.
The gag order, [Chutkan] said in a ruling issued from the bench after a hearing, will prohibit all parties from statements “publicly targeting” special counsel Jack Smith, his staff, her staff or “any other court personnel.” Statements about the families of those individuals are “absolutely prohibited as well.”
Even before the order was issued, Trump’s lawyer John Lauro said they would appeal any such order, as it would affect important free speech principles, particularly for a leading candidate for president.
Trump “can argue that this prosecution is politically motivated,” the judge said, but he cannot disparage the prosecutor by calling him a thug or “vilify and implicitly encourage violence against public servants who are simply doing their jobs.”
Seems reasonable. But hey, if MTG really wants to seek a gag order prohibiting people on bicycles from calling her a fascist, she’s welcome to try. It would almost guarantee more such behavior, but there’s a principle at stake here. No one other than Marge knows what that principle is, but this is America. She has every right to make a damn fool of herself. And we have every right to enjoy it.
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