The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, while being quite short, covers several very important fundamental rights. It states that Congress cannot make a law that

• establishes an official religion, or
• prohibits free exercise of a religion, or
• limits the freedom of speech, or
• limits the freedom of press, or
• limits the right of people for peaceful assembly, or
• limits the right of people to file formal complaints against the government.

Of these, probably the most well-known right is the freedom of speech, so much so that in many contexts, the First Amendment and freedom of speech have been used interchangeably. This, of course, does not make any of the other provisions of the amendment any less significant. And that’s where the extent of the hypocrisy of some, who believe themselves to be staunch supporters of the First Amendment, may be exposed. I will get to this shortly, but first, I want to emphasize a fact that, while being trivial, is often overlooked or ignored.

While the laws of a nation provide protections for certain rights of their citizens, no right is unlimited. Probably the best rule of thumb is that the a given right of one citizen is protected to the extent that it does not infringe upon any right of any other citizen. So, while the First Amendment provides protection for free speech, it certainly does not mean that one person can threaten, by their speech, the life of another person. That would infringe the right to live and safety of that other person. Similarly, while the Second Amendment provides protection for the right to bear arms, that right is not unlimited either. For those who believe they have unlimited rights to own weapons, I would suggest that they try purchasing a military tank or a BICM, and then see how they will be treated by this very pro Second Amendment administration. So a big challenge for the Congress and the Supreme Court is to define the bounds on the Constitutionally protected rights in a way that they don’t infringe upon any other protected rights, without introducing unnecessary burden or limitations.

Now, back to the First Amendment and the hypocrisy of some of its staunchest supporters; there are individuals and even politicians with law degrees, who pretend to believe in absolute freedom of speech based on the First Amendment’s provisions, but at the same time they are perfectly fine with mandating display of the Ten Commandments in public schools. I have nothing against the Ten Commandments. In fact, I wish the same people who so strongly feel about displaying them in schools had the same devotion to personally follow them and expected their dear cult leader to have followed them as well. But that’s beside the point. The point is that the same First Amendment on which they base their claim on absolute freedom of speech, also prohibits the government from establishing an official religion for the country. And if they claim that the mandate for displaying the Ten Commandments has nothing to do with establishing an official religion for the nation but rather is protected by the clause for freedom of exercise of any religion, then I wonder how they would feel if a non-Christian teacher wanted to display a scripture of their own religion in their classroom.

Another important point about the First Amendment, at least in my opinion, is that all of its provisions seem to be in the context of protections against the government limiting such freedoms. More specifically, take the last provision which explicitly mentions the government, and clearly prohibits the government from imposing restrictions or retaliating against those who file formal complaints against the government. In my opinion, all other provisions of the First Amendment should also be considered within the same context. That is, the rights to free speech and free press were probably meant to protect citizens and news organizations from government retaliation if they exposed some wrongdoings by the government or otherwise expressed their criticism of the government. And this is extremely important since the government has so many levers that it can use to apply pressure to silence any critic, as I will discuss below. If one adopts this interpretation, then it becomes clear that there was no reason for the Framers to add provisions that provides protection for all speech including those that spread demonstrable falsehoods with the purpose of deceiving people to support a certain political agenda, or even worse, spread certain conspiracy theories for their personal financial gain. Of course, I am not advocating for the government or any other entity to go around using lie detectors on everyone to see who is lying and who is telling the truth, but the fact that we sign our tax return documents to be accurate under penalty of perjury, or are placed under oath if we are required to provide testimony in a court of law, to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, is evidence that the limitations on free speech are not just for when they are believed to endanger another person’s life or safety. Lying or not telling the whole truth is also not protected, at least under certain conditions. My close friends are familiar with my radical idea (also described in one of my early posts) of placing everyone under oath at all times. For those who find this outrageous, and I know there are many, I would like to ask if they can come up with an example of a profession or a scenario in which an individual has a reasonable and justifiable need to lie.

So I say let’s place every citizen, including myself, under perpetual oath when they obtain their first drivers license, and every visitor to the country when they obtain their visa and for the duration of their stay. Let’s place the politicians and opinion show hosts that constantly complain about fake news, and those who they complain about, under perpetual oath, and see who feels perfectly comfortable about it, and who starts yelling and screaming that their first amendment rights are being violated as if the First Amendment requires people to lie. And please note that the same way the requirement to be truthful in our tax return documents under penalty of perjury is not against the First Amendment protections, the above proposal is not either. People and press can still legitimately criticize the government or file complaints against it without the fear of retaliation and retribution.

I hope you are still with me, because I know I haven’t even touched upon the topic that is the title of this post. Yes, Trump (or Mr. President, for those friends of mine who demand respect for the current president while being perfectly fine with me calling other presidents, even when they were in office, simply as Obama or Biden) has a long history of trying to use (or rather, abuse) the court system to intimidate his perceived enemies. After all, when you have the financial means, you can force most of your foes to capitulation by filing lawsuits, oftentimes even obviously frivolous ones, against them and intimidating them by the large legal bills if they decide to defend themselves. Just to name a few, in 2020, Mr. President’s re-election campaign sued the New York Times for libel over an opinion essay. That lawsuit was dismissed. In 2021, Mr. President sued the same newspaper over an investigation into his financial history. That lawsuit was also dismissed and the plaintiff was ordered to pay the legal expenses of the defendant. Mr. President has sued the New York Times again recently, this time over a series of articles before the 2024 election, claiming that they were aimed at hurting his candidacy and caused “enormous” damage to his “professional and occupational interests.” The suit, which asks for $15 billion in damages, accuses the newspaper and four of its reporters, as well as the book publisher Penguin Random House, of disparaging Mr. President’s reputation as a successful businessman.

Yesterday, a federal judge in Florida threw out the above defamation suit, calling it “improper” and “impermissible” in its present form. He criticized Mr. President’s lawyers for waiting until the 80th page (of an 85-page complaint) to lodge a format allegation of defamation, and for including, ahead of that, dozens of “florid and enervating” pages lavishing praise on the president and enumerating a range of grievances. It’s no secret that Mr. President likes very much to be praised, as it is evident from the hours-long cabinet meetings during which the cabinet members compete with each other to prove that they are a better a$$ kisser than the others. But I am surprised of his lawyers putting similar praises of the president or criticisms of his adversaries in the lawsuits they file on his behalf. As if Mr. President is ever capable of or willing to read those lengthy legal documents. Maybe the lawyers read those sections of their filings to Mr. Presidents before filing, just to score some points and stay on his good side. But, in any case, the judge was not having any of that, as he wrote: “a complaint is not a public forum for vituperation and invective,” and “not a protected platform to rage against an adversary.”

The President’s lawyers still have 28 days to revise their filing and resubmit their complaint. And who knows, maybe he will actually win or settle the case. This is only one of his most recent attacks on media institutions. He sued the Wall Street Journal in July for an article about his relationship with Jeffery Epstein. He had also sued CBS News and ABC News for billions of dollars over their news coverage, and was able to extract a $16 million settlement from each network. While, as I mentioned, his attacks on news media and the First Amendment are nothing new, he is now able to use the significant leverages of the government to force these institutions to capitulate. He has placed his cronies in charge of every governmental agency that he could, and has tried to do the same for other agencies over which he does not have the same authority. He has Brendan Carr as the FCC chairman. A person who has so far acted more like his personal enforcer, threatening, in thinly veiled statements, media companies with retaliation if they don’t capitulate and settle with the president in his personal lawsuits. Both of Mr. President’s lawsuits against CBS News and ABC News were at best frivolous according to many legal experts. But the companies chose to settle, maybe out of fear of retaliation by the FCC. In the case of CBS, it actually had a pending merger request in front of the FCC, which was eventually approved only a short time after it settled with the president for $16 million. Mr. President himself has not shied away from threatening media companies, in several occasions, to revoke their licenses over their news coverage.

If my understanding of the First Amendment is correct, what the president is currently doing to the media companies is exactly what the Framers were afraid of and introduced the First Amendment’s protections only to address situations like this. Otherwise, I doubt the Framers believed that the ability of citizens to lie and spread falsehoods was essential for the country to thrive and prosper.