Pam Bondi gets schooled on the First Amendment
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor appeared to take aim at recent remarks by Attorney General Pam Bondi vowing to “target” anyone who uses “hate speech” following the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“Every time I listen to a lawyer-trained representative saying we should criminalize free speech in some way, I think to myself, that law school failed,” Sotomayor said while speaking on a panel Tuesday morning at New York Law School. [Continue reading…]
In an editorial, the Wall Street Journal says:
Is a basic understanding of the First Amendment too much to expect from the nation’s Attorney General? Progressives have spent years trying to create and define a category called “hate speech.” This misunderstanding of the First Amendment seems to have infiltrated the D.C. water supply because AG Pam Bondi repeated it Monday in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
Discussing Kirk’s work on college campuses, Ms. Bondi mentioned the “disgusting” antisemitism on display at many universities, and so far so good. But wait. “There’s free speech and then there’s hate speech, and there is no place—especially now, especially after what happened to Charlie, in our society,” the country’s top law enforcer told a podcast. “We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.”
Kirk would want a word. “My position is that even hate speech should be completely and totally allowed in our country. The most disgusting speech should absolutely be protected,” he once told a crowd. [Continue reading…]
When asked about Bondi’s comments on Tuesday, Trump told an ABC News reporter: “We’ll probably go after people like you because you treat me so unfairly. It’s hate. You have a lot of hate in your heart. Maybe they’ll come after ABC.”
Bondi also threatened to prosecute an Office Depot employee who reportedly refused to print flyers for a vigil for Kirk.
But people on the right who normally strongly support Trump have condemned Bondi’s comments and called for her ouster.
Conservative pundit Matt Walsh, who said after Kirk’s death: “We are up against demonic forces from the pit of Hell,” posted on Twitter/X of Bondi: “Get rid of her. Today. This is insane. Conservatives have fought for decades for the right to refuse service to anyone. We won that fight. Now Pam Bondi wants to roll it all back for no reason.”
Erick Erickson, a conservative commentator, also wrote on X: “Our Attorney General is apparently a moron. ‘There’s free speech and then there is hate speech.’ No ma’am. That is not the law.”
And Savanah Hernandez, a commentator with Turning Point, described those words from Bondi as “most destructive phrase that has ever been uttered … She needs to be removed as attorney general now.” [Continue reading…]