Posted on 03/21/2023 7:50:13 AM PDT by algore
A Trump-supporting Twitter influencer who is charged with conspiring to deprive citizens of their right to vote in the 2016 presidential election has appeared for trial in federal court.
Douglass Mackey, 33 - known on the internet as 'Ricky Vaughn' - is standing trial over his tweets encouraging Hillary Clinton supporters to cast meaningless votes by text message, instead of casting an actual ballot.
Following the first day of trial on Monday, Mackey was spotted leaving the Brooklyn federal courthouse dressed in a navy suit, white shirt, and pink polka-dot tie, with his father walking at his side.
During his opening remarks, Mackey's attorney Andrew Frisch argued that his memes encouraging Clinton supporters to 'vote from home' by text were simply 'online trash-talking' in the hopes of gaining viral fame.
'Mr. Mackey did not share the memes as some sort of grand plan,' Frisch told the jury, according to the New York Daily News, arguing that the idea of voting by text was patently ridiculous to anyone with basic knowledge of US elections.
According to a criminal complaint, Mackey and unnamed co-conspirators created a number of images purporting to be Clinton campaign ads, with messages such as 'Avoid the Line. Vote from Home. Text 'Hillary' to 59925.'
The phony campaign ads also carried fine print falsely claiming they were 'Paid for by Hillary for President 2016'.
The phone number in the fake ads received least 4,900 text message responses with variations on Clinton's name, including some from people in New York, prosecutors said
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Pretty clever. But wrong.
It’s not wrong. People should know better. If they don’t, they have no business voting anyway.
If you had to vote at the polls on election day this would not be an issue. But with ballot harvesting and other ways to gain unfair advantage, the landscape is ripe for hoaxes such as this.
Well if what you did pushed Trump over the top you delayed ww3 forb1 term
I can’t see how that is illegal.
Just a suggestion. .
If it’s not there should be massive campaign around this for 2024 which targets Dem voters
Nothing wrong here. Obviously, people are ignorant of voting laws and/or have no sense of humor.
As parody, the only problem is using the campaign’s signature. Too bad he did that as otherwise this could be dismissed as parody. Besides, if the voters are too stupid to know that they must vote in person, that is their problem. And in bigger picture, have they prosecuted any of the malicious efforts to undermine Republican votes with false or parody ads?
Have to agree with fwdude — there is nothing legally or morally wrong with telling folks a lie.
He is not a person with authority to tell people what to do — he isn’t an election commissioner or anyone else like that.
If some guy walks up to you on the street and offers to sell you a Rolex — if you believe that it is your problem. Not the actual selling of bogus stuff, that is illegal. Just the offer. If you fall for that, go back to living in your Mom’s basement, you are too stupid to survive.
This would have been 1A-protected satire had he put a clear disclaimer at the bottom. But he didn’t.
I’m happy I’m not on that jury. I believe in wide 1A protection, but here…I dunno.
This kind of thing has been going around for many years. I remember seeing: Republicans vote on Tuesday and Democrats vote of Wednesday, and vice-versa going back as far as 2000 maybe even earlier. This is just an updated version of the same thing. This is just another attempt to what has now become The American Cheka to crush all dissent by criminalizing dissent. That’s why over 1000 people have been arrested in connection with January 6th, and an announcement that maybe as many as 1000 more will be arrested. Whether that actually happens or not, just the mere announcement of it has a chilling effect on freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom of association. That’s why the American Cheka is already putting up barricades in NY, they really aren’t expecting any violent outburst, they are just putting them up to intimidate Trump voters even if they assemble and peacefully wave flags and signs.
Newspapers are caught printing inaccurate stories all the time, many bearing on public and political figures.
How do they deal with it?
They print a retraction. Buried in the middle of the ‘B’ section.
So make him compose a meme retracting this:
I’m sorry if anyone was mislead...”
But those people want 10 years!
How is that wrong??
Isn’t a person supposed to know how to vote?
If they’re that dumb, this Country does not need they’re input!
If people fell for it then it’s their own fault. We have free speech in this country (in theory).
Wild Thing!
That was probably the thing that got him into trouble.
would have been 1A-protected satire had he put a clear disclaimer at the bottom.
/\
Hmm
Missed reading about the disclaimer in the b.o.r.’s 1st Amendment text.
Oh ya, that’s cuz it isn’t there !
Satire disclaimer ?
Pffft.
(You don’t lean right far enough , or even at all. )
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