Trump’s
Free-Speech Fandango
Jim Kavanagh
So, Donald Trump dropped this fierce speech, promising to “reclaim
the right to free speech for all Americans,” prompting an ecstatically joyful
reaction from Elon Musk and from RFK, Jr.
who says it makes Trump one of “the greatest U.S. presidents since
Lincoln.”
Sorry, it’s a long and necessary quote:
If we don't have free speech, then we just don't have a free
country. It's as simple as that. if this most fundamental right is allowed to
perish, then the rest of our rights and Liberties will topple just like
dominoes. One by one they'll go down.
That's why, today, I'm announcing my plan to shatter the
left-wing censorship regime and to reclaim the right to free speech for all
Americans. And “reclaim” is a very important word in this case, because they've
taken it away. In recent weeks, bombshell reports have confirmed that a sinister
group of Deep-State bureaucrats, Silicon Valley tyrants, left-wing activists,
and depraved corporate news media have been conspiring to manipulate and
silence the American people. They have collaborated to suppress vital
Information on everything from elections to public health. The censorship
cartel must be dismantled and destroyed, and it must happen immediately.
And here is my plan: First, within hours of my inauguration I
will sign an executive order banning any federal department or agency from colluding with any organization, business, or person to
censor, limit, categorize, or impede the lawful speech of American
citizens. I will then ban federal money from being used to label domestic
speech as mis- or dis-information, and I will begin the process of identifying
and firing every federal bureaucrat who has engaged in domestic censorship—directly
or indirectly, whether they are the Department of Homeland Security, the Department
of Health and Human Services, the FBI, the DOJ, no matter who they are.
Second, I will order the Department of Justice to investigate
all parties involved in the new unlined censorship regime, which is absolutely destructive
and terrible, and to aggressively prosecute any and all crimes identified—these
include possible violations of federal civil-rights law, campaign finance laws,
federal election law, securities law, and antitrust laws, the Hatch Act and a
host of other potential criminal, civil, regulatory, and constitutional
offenses. To assist in these efforts, I am urging House Republicans to
immediately send preservation letters—and we have to do this right now—to the Biden
administration, the Biden campaign, and every Silicon Valley tech giant
ordering them not to destroy evidence of censorship.
Third, upon my inauguration as president. I will ask Congress
to send bill to my desk revising section 230 to get big online platforms out of
censorship business from now on. Digital platform should only qualify for
immunity protection under Section 230 if they meet high standards of neutrality,
transparency, fairness, and non-discrimination. We should require these
platforms to increase their efforts to take down unlawful content such as child
exploitation and promoting terrorism, while dramatically curtailing their
power to arbitrarily restrict lawful speech.
Fourth. we need to break up the entire toxic censorship
industry that has arisen under the false guise of tackling so-called mis- and
disinformation. The federal government should immediately stop funding all
nonprofits and academic programs that support this authoritarian project. If
any U.S. university has discovered to have engaged in censorship activities or
election interferences in the past, such as flagging social media content for
removal or blacklisting, those universities should lose federal research
dollars and federal student loan support for a period of five years, and maybe
more. We should also enact new laws laying out clear criminal penalties for
federal bureaucrats who partner with private entities to do an end run around
the Constitution and deprive Americans of their first fourth and fifth amendment
rights. In other words, deprive them of their vote. And once you lose those elections,
and once you lose your borders, like we have, you no longer have a country. Furthermore, to confront problems of major
platforms being infiltrated by legions of former deep-staters and intelligence
officials, there should be a seven-year cooling-off period before any employee
of the FBI, CIA, NSA, DNI, DHS, or DOD is allowed to take a job at a company
possessing vast quantities of U.S. user data.
Fifth, the time has finally come for Congress to pass a
digital Bill of Rights. This should include a right to digital due process. In
other words, government officials should need a court order to take down online
content, not send information requests such as the FBI was sending to Twitter. Furthermore,
when users of big online platforms have their content or accounts removed, throttled, shadowbanned, or otherwise restricted—no matter
what name they use—they should have the right to be informed that it's happening,
the right to a specific explanation of the reason why. and the right to a
timely appeal. In addition, all users over the age of 18 should have the right
to opt out of content moderation and curation entirely and receive an
unmanipulated stream of information if they so choose. The fight for free
speech is a matter of victory or death for America, and for the survival of
Western Civilization itself. When I am president, this whole rotten system of
censorship and information control will be ripped out of the system at large. There
won't be anything left.a By restoring free speech, we’ll begin to reclaim our
democracy and save our nation. Thank you, and God bless America.
Though I’m dismayed by the idea that they are “left-wing” political
actors, I agree that the Biden administration has engaged in an assault on free
speech and the unique protection offered to free speech by the First Amendment.
It’s arguably the worst such assault since the Espionage
and Sedition Acts of 1917-8.[1]
I agree that the Biden administration and the bulk of the Democratic Party and
its allied media created a public-private “censorship cartel,” much as Trump
describes, that “must be dismantled and
destroyed,” much as Trump describes.
Except, just one little thing my Colombo-Spidey
senses notice: “We should require these platforms to increase their
efforts to take down unlawful content such as child exploitation and
promoting terrorism,”
Excuse me while I fire up my eighteen-wheeler to drive
through that loophole.
Please harken to what President-elect Trump, no free-speech
“absolutist,” tells us in the midst of this militant anti-censorship rant: The
Trump administration will require platforms—i.e., demand via legal and
financial governmental coercion— to increase their suppression of any
content “promoting terrorism.”
“Promoting” is a slippery word that was placed in Trump’s
speech about free speech quite deliberately. The context of a discussion of
social media platforms makes it clear: Trump is not here saying his administration
will require suppression of material acts of terrorism but of speech acts promoting
terrorism, which he’s defining, along with “child exploitation,” as “unlawful” and
outside the realm of free speech.
Is there anybody on planet Earth who does not see exactly
what is going to happen? “Promoting terrorism” will replace “misinformation” as
the free-speech, First-Amendment exception, the rationale for more
government-mandated censorship in the realm of political speech and expression,
not less. At least in any of the many corners of the discursive universe where
the word “terrorism” might be conjured up. And guess where, above all, that
most definitely will be? You have one guess.
