Turley:
Trump indictment would ‘bulldoze’ the First Amendment if it succeeds
Former President Donald Trump was indicted earlier this week
Constitutional law professor and Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley says the Trump indictment threatens to destroy the First Amendment.
www.foxnews.com
5 Aug 2023 ~~ By Peter Kasperowicz
The
latest indictment of former President Trump threatens to destroy the First Amendment and give the federal government the unprecedented power to criminalize political lies, constitutional law professor and Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley warned Saturday.
Trump was indicted this week on four charges related to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into 2020 election interference and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, including conspiracy to defraud the United States. Trump pleaded not guilty to all charges in a Washington, D.C., courtroom Thursday.
In an op-ed for The Hill, Turley wrote that Smith’s indictment
essentially charges Trump for spreading "lies that there had been outcome-determinative fraud in the election," which he said is a dangerous proposition for the First Amendment.
"In order to secure convictions for this, Special Counsel Jack Smith would need to bulldoze through not just the First Amendment but also existing case law holding that even false statements are protected," he wrote.
Specifically, Turley said Smith’s charges assert that Trump knew the statements he made about the 2020 election were false and said if Trump does believe he won, "the indictment collapses."
In an effort to show Trump knew he lost legitimately, the indictment explains that many people advised him that he lost. Turley said
Trump sought out people who said he won but that he is allowed to do this.
~Snip~
Turley said there is a "
constitutional problem" with trying to "criminalize lies" in this way. He said a 2012 Supreme Court case, United States v. Alvarez, found that it’s unconstitutional to criminalize lies and that the court recognized that ruling otherwise would give the government "broad censorial power unprecedented in this court’s cases or in our constitutional tradition."
"So, even assuming that Smith can prove Trump lied, there would still be constitutional barriers to criminalizing his false statements," Turley wrote.
Turley added that even if Judge Tanya Chutkan supports Smith’s case, "the Supreme Court would likely balk at the criminalization of false political speech."
Commentary:
Does anyone think it possible for `We The People` to criminalize political lies? Seems that Leftists in our government have stronger protection under the First Amendment than `We The People`
That's what we get when we grant personhood on our corporations, including the ones that extract taxes from us.
A majority of Americans believe that the 2020 election result was not the will of the majority of people who voted, and specifically not the will of the majority of people who voted legally in the crucial swing states for the electoral college count. I think that's exactly the same opinion that Trump has, and that the reason that the charges of determinative fraud are "unsubstantiated" is because every effort he and his team made to litigate the results was thwarted in the courts and the media. Bring it on, Mr. Smith--we thwarted `Deplorables` can finally have our day in court where Trump can prove that he wasn't the one who was lying about the 2020 election.
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