For everyone keeping track of whether the U.S. will remain a democracy, these are dark days.
Writing for the Cato Institute, hardly a left-wing bastion, David J. Bier explains one key aspect of the current mess with the headline of his piece: US Citizens Don’t Have First Amendment Rights If Noncitizens Don’t.
Following is a summary, but you may wish to read the entire article:
Every restriction on the free speech rights of noncitizens is also a restriction on the free speech rights of Americans. For one thing, free speech is a protection for listeners as much as it is for speakers, and in that way, it undermines everyone’s right to hear when the government shuts down anyone’s right to speak freely.
Trump’s administration is threatening US citizens’ free speech rights in many other ways, such as threatening arrests of people who inform noncitizens of their constitutional rights, filing shakedown lawsuits against media companies, attacking law firms that defend unpopular clients, canceling contracts in states where governors have criticized Trump, threatening sanctions against media companies for negative coverage of him, banning disfavored media from the White House, and sanctioning federal contractors for use of the words “diversity, equity, or inclusion.”
The administration’s assault on noncitizen speech reveals a much deeper problem. A significant portion of the American public has simply forgotten the value of free speech entirely, and that’s the biggest threat to free speech of all.
That last point Bier makes is what concerns me the most. Free speech has always been a controversial subject for Americans, because it truly has always been a revolutionary concept.
As such, it is completely at odds with authoritarian power, which seeks complete control over what is said and what is heard. Therefore, it is not surprising that we have reached this moment of crisis between Trump and the Constitution.
The question now is, when it comes to the First Amendment, which side are the people on?
HEADLINES:
"It’s The End Of Democracy": Americans Are Reacting To Donald Trump's Latest Decision — And They're Not Holding Back (BuzzFeed)
Trump to the USA: There Is No Rule of Law (Mother Jones)
Trump administration has done nothing to facilitate release of wrongly deported Maryland man, his lawyers say (ABC)
Trump is using Kilmar Abrego Garcia to send the Supreme Court a message (MSNBC)
Trump has been escalating his war with the media, allowing members of his administration to take turns bashing a CNN reporter, denying journalists access to the Oval Office and calling for networks to be punished. [HuffPost]
White House bars AP reporter, defying court order (Axios)
US Citizens Don’t Have First Amendment Rights If Noncitizens Don’t (Cato)
Trump threatens Harvard's tax-exempt status after freezing $2bn funding (BBC)
The Promise of American Higher Education (Harvard)
What Harvard Learned From Columbia’s Mistake (Atlantic)
Palestinian Columbia Student Detained by ICE at U.S. Citizenship Interview (WSJ)
Inside DOGE’s push to defy a court order and access Social Security data (WP)
Pentagon’s ‘SWAT team of nerds’ resigns en masse (Politico)
Why It’s Impossible for Most Small Businesses to Manufacture in the US (Wired)
DOGE is collecting federal data to remove immigrants from housing, jobs (WP)
Autism rates have risen to 1 in 31 school-age children, CDC reports (NBC)
Measles cases in Texas rise to 561, state health department says (Reuters)
Orban Escalates Culture War in Hungary by Mandating Two Genders Only (NYT)
Investors are abandoning the dollar and Treasuries, scared by the trade war (WP)
China Outs US Hackers for Attack, a New Frontier in Spy Games (Bloomberg)
Xi makes a case for free trade, presenting China as a source of ‘stability and certainty’ (AP)
Van Gogh’s Last Painting Poses a Problem for an Idyllic French Village (NYT)
OpenAI is building a social network (Verge)
Teachers Worry About Students Using A.I. But They Love It for Themselves. (NYT)
“How can I return an innocent man to the United States when I don’t have the ability to feel empathy or compassion?” said Nayib Bukele (The Onion)
MUSIC:
Lee Ann Womack & Kacey Musgraves Livin' on love CMT Music Awards 2014
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