Commentary
While there are numerous charges in the latest indictment brought against former President Trump, “Our focus is on the fact that this is an attack on free speech and political advocacy,” said Trump lawyer John Lauro.
“What we now have is an administration that has criminalized the free speech and advocacy of a prior administration during the time that there is a political election going on. That’s unprecedented.
“(Trump) had every right to advocate for his position while he was president. He saw irregularities, he saw deficiencies in the voting process, he raised those. He had every right, in fact a responsibility, as a United States president, to raise those issues and now his advocacy is being criminalized.”
There’s more, much more. He is being charged with attempting to defraud the election process even though he had every right to speak, and lie, publicly about the election. “That’s not a crime,” said Jimmy Gurule’, a criminal law professor at Notre Dame Law School.
The indictment, which charges Trump with conspiracy, obstructing an official proceeding, fraud against the United States and a conspiracy to deprive people of the right to vote, all focuses on steps Trump took beyond just speech.
On our Freedom of Speech
I am old enough to remember my parents subscribing to the Saturday Evening Post magazine with its familiar covers by Norman Rockwell, however, I was just five years old when the first of the Post’s cover series on the four freedoms, Freedom of Speech, was featured on February 20, 1943.
Rockwell painted 323 covers for the Post over a period of 47 years. Known for his ability to realistically capture a subject to his satisfaction, actually painted several versions of this cover before settling on the one accompanying this piece.
Later, it was used on a poster used in the U.S. government’s war bond drive.
Why the Painting? Why Now?
The painting depicts a blue-collar worker standing among a group of other attendees wearing white shirts, ties and jackets. Standing tall, his mouth open, his shining eyes transfixed as he speaks his mind, untrammeled and unafraid. It’s how it may have looked in the forties.
It came to mind while drafting my commentary on Attorney General Merrick Garland’s over-the-top memo to FBI offices across the nation citing an increase in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school board members, teachers, and public-school workers. I intended to publish the artwork at that time, but space became a problem.
The FBI, he related, would help “determine how federal enforcement can be used to prosecute these crimes.”
A woman, said to be a member of a “right-wing mom’s group” called Moms for Liberty, who happened to be gun owner, was later determined by FBI officials that she was not a threat.
Standing up at a school board meeting, she shouted, “we are coming for you.”
In another meeting in Loudoun County, Virgina, a father was wrestled the floor and arrested during a confrontation over the cover up of an alleged sexual assault his daughter experienced in a bathroom.
You may recall the uproar over Garland’s colluding with the National School Boards Association to fabricate a pretext for the use of federal law enforcement authorities against parents. The association cited both events in a letter to Garland.
The politicized DOJ under Garland interpreted those events as threats, but Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was not arrested when he stood on the steps of the Supreme Court and threatened, “I want to tell your Gorsuch. I want to tell you Kavanaugh. You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”
Although that threat and that imposed by those picketing the residences of the Justices is a direct violation of 18 U.S. Code 1503, Garland has chosen not to charge those parties.
Free Speech and Trump
Now, Attorney General Garland has directed Special Counsel Jack Smith to throw the kitchen sink at former President Trump in an unprecedented attack on an opposition candidate in a presidential election.
They have “released the whirlwind,” to borrow the words of Senator Schumer. Trumps lawyers will have subpoena power and could summon Garland and other key players to appear in court.
They will undoubtedly want to know how the Hillary Clinton-paid campaign to defraud voters over Russian collusion and the Steele Dossier was different.
Then there’s the FBI meetings with social media and the disenfranchising of voters with the orchestrated letter from 51 former intelligence officers just prior to the 2020 election.
Meanwhile, as we await the Trump trials, scheduled and unscheduled, the New York Times/Sienna College poll has Trump dominating his closest rival Ron DeSantis by 37 percentage points.
May God continue to bless the United States of America.
