Even conservatives push back after AG Pam Bondi wrongly claims ‘hate speech’ isn’t protected
It’s been quite a couple of days for Pam Bondi. The attorney general is twisting herself into a pretzel, first acting all tough about banning so-called “hate speech,” and then trying to explain what she meant after getting slammed from all sides of the political spectrum.
This all has come about in the aftermath of the shooting of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.
On a podcast hosted by Katie Miller, wife of Trump adviser Stephen Miller, Bondi said, “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. … We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.”
But as MSNBC’s Jordan Rubin points out, “That sounds like the sort of thing that maybe could be true, especially coming from a nominally authoritative figure like the attorney general of the United States. But she’s incorrect. The law doesn’t make such a distinction. The point has been reinforced by none other than Justice Samuel Alito, certainly no wilting liberal.”
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