Posted on 03/20/2016 2:01:02 PM PDT by drewh
Donald Trump is once again shrugging off the escalating violence at his rallies, saying the people protesting his presidential campaign are largely to blame for incidents.
“These people are very disruptive,” Trump said on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” on Sunday. “These are not innocent lambs.”
The Republican frontrunner said the demonstrators who shut down an Arizona highway leading to the Phoenix suburb where he was scheduled to speak were violating his right to free speech — and the rights of his supporters to come hear him.
“They’re really stopping our First Amendment rights,” Trump said. “If you think about it, George, they block … they blocked a road, they put their cars in front of a road. We had thousands and thousands of people wanting to come. They were delayed for an hour because of these protesters.”
Trump continued: “These are professional agitators, and I think that somebody should say that when a road is blocked going into the event so that people have to wait sometimes hours to get in, I think that’s very [unfair] and there should be blame there, too.”
He added: “I think it’s very unfair that these, really, in many cases professional, in many cases sick protesters can put cars in a road blocking thousands of great Americans from coming to a speech and nobody says anything about that.”
The brash billionaire also refused to condemn one of his supporters who punched a protester as he was being removed by security.
“He or his partner was wearing a Ku Klux Klan outfit,” Trump said of the protester. “This happened to be an African-American man who was very — a person at the rally, who was very, very incensed at the fact that somebody, a protester, would be wearing a Ku Klux Klan outfit. Frankly, that was, you know, it was a tough thing to watch. And I watched that. But why would a protester walk into a room with a Ku Klux Klan outfit on?”
“We don’t condone violence, and I say it,” he said. “And we have very little violence, very, very little violence at the rallies.”
Trump even applauded his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, after a video appeared to show Lewandowski grabbing the collar of a protester at a rally in Tucson.
“I give him credit for having spirit,” Trump said. “He wanted them to take down those horrible, profanity-laced signs.”
Lewandowski came under fire earlier this month after he allegedly assaulted Breitbart News reporter Michelle Fields after a press conference in Florida. Trump’s campaign denies her claims.
“When signs are put up, lifted up with tremendous profanity on them — I mean the worst profanity, and you have television cameras all over the place and people see these signs — I think maybe those people have some blame and should suffer some blame,” Trump said.
They are doing everything except for physically duct taping his mouth; how can anyone claim they are not stifling free speech?
Are Trump supporters completely incapable of staying on topic? The question is not whether what they are doing is legal, moral, ethical or even polite - the question being discussed here is whether it constitutes a violation of Trump’s 1st amendment rights, as he claims. It does not.
So — people want to vote for a guy who doesn’t understand how the First Amendment works. Woe to the republic
My right to protest ends where it interferes with other folks’ rights.
These people went beyond protesting into acts of interfering and disrupting.
Well, we should find out more about him before too long.
I think it is what it first appears to be, but you could be right.
There may be contractual issues or local ordinances that may come into play, but it is not a Constitutional case unless there is a law that prevents you from flying the flag.
A person sues and artist because he/she does not like the content because he/ she feels it offends thier religion.
In order to prevail in a suit, they have to show that there is an injury in fact, and that there is a remedy that the law allows. Just being offended probably would not be a sufficient "injury", but who knows these days. But unless it is the government that is suing the artist, or unless the outcome of the suit would be to have the government impose some kind of sanctions or prohibit the artist from creating or presenting their art, then this also would not be a 1st Amendment case.
Considering its government operatives like in Chicago doing it and Government agents like the democrat parties violent thugs, its fully covered, We have the right to freedom of assemble and association and to petition for redress, all are protected from professional disruptor organizations.
Conspiracy to violate civil rights applies to civilians as well as government, see KKK cases.
I would agree. And I would also agree that anyone breaking the law should be prosecuted to the fullest. We should not allow people to shout down opinions with which they disagree (althoug Trump does seem to like to do just that at debates...)
tell that to the KKK.
tell that to the KKK.
Tell that to the KKK.
“The Donald says he wants to gut the first amendment protection of the press so he can sue them for libel. Hard to complain that his rights are now being violated.”
No, he did not. All he asked for is the right not to be defamed restored after a Liberal U.S. Supreme Court denied this right, about 1964, for certain people. The United States maintained the right of Free speech for people for much more than a century before the U.S. Supreme Court decision. Trump is only asking for a reasonable restoration of the right not to be defamed with total impunity.
During the period immediately following the Civil War, civil rights legislation was originally enacted by Congress, based upon its power under the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to pass laws to enforce these rights. The first two of these laws were based upon the civil rights act of 1866 (42 U.S.C.A. § 1982), which had preceded the Fourteenth Amendment.
The first civil rights law guaranteed equal rights under the law for all people who lived within the jurisdiction of the United States. The second guaranteed each citizen an equal right to own, inherit, rent, purchase, and sell real property as well as personal property. The third original civil rights law, the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 (17 Stat. 13), provided citizens with the right to bring a civil action for a violation of protected rights. The fourth law made violation of such rights a criminal offense.
They are.
WOW!
And when they bring those cases against individuals, do they charge them under certain laws or do they charge them for breaking the 1st amendment?
During the period immediately following the Civil War, civil rights legislation was originally enacted by Congress, based upon its power under the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to pass laws to enforce these rights. The first two of these laws were based upon the civil rights act of 1866 (42 U.S.C.A. § 1982), which had preceded the Fourteenth Amendment.
The first civil rights law guaranteed equal rights under the law for all people who lived within the jurisdiction of the United States. The second guaranteed each citizen an equal right to own, inherit, rent, purchase, and sell real property as well as personal property. The third original civil rights law, the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 (17 Stat. 13), provided citizens with the right to bring a civil action for a violation of protected rights. The fourth law made violation of such rights a criminal offense.
The protestors aren’t only violating Trump’s First Amendment rights. They’re also quashing his guests’ rights of peaceable assembly and freedom of association.
And we have posters on this site who condone that. What has happened to America?
Inquiring minds want to know why nobody protests Cruz rallies. I know the answer.
The right that he has to not be interrupted by protesters was also the result was of a Supreme Court ruling.
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