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“President Donald Trump [last] Monday signed an executive order requiring the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute people for burning the American flag, an activity that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled is legitimate political expression protected by the U.S. Constitution…
“The order the Republican president signed in the Oval Office acknowledged the court’s 5-4 ruling in a case from Texas in 1989, but said there is still room to prosecute flag burning if it ‘is likely to incite imminent lawless action’ or amounts to ‘fighting words.’…
“‘You burn a flag, you get one year in jail. You don’t get 10 years, you don’t get one month,’ Trump said. ‘You get one year in jail, and it goes on your record, and you will see flag burning stopping immediately.’” AP News
The left opposes the executive order, arguing that Trump is attempting to criminalize dissent.
“Trump’s order is likely to backfire… The order notes, correctly, that flag-burners could be charged for violating general, ‘content-neutral’ prohibitions on public burning, which serve environmental or public-safety interests, even though the Court has held that laws singling out the burning of flags are unconstitutional. Accordingly, the federal government has charged the combat veteran with violating a rule that bars burning of any kind in D.C.’s Lafayette Park…
“But Trump’s order may make even these kinds of prosecutions more difficult… When the government selectively enforces an otherwise content-neutral law—say, by prosecuting those who burn flags but not those who burn trash—and does so because it disagrees with the message an individual expresses, the Constitution requires that the charges be dismissed. The difficulty in most cases is proving that the government’s purpose was illegal. But the Trump order proudly pronounces it.”
David Cole, The Atlantic
“Burning the American flag may be legal, but that doesn't make it popular among Americans as a form of protest. Trump is clearly hoping Democrats take the bait and defend flag burning, so he can cast them as anti-American. This is one spot where Democrats should just let the courts do their job as a branch of government…
“The president doesn't have the power to jail anyone for a year for burning the flag. His executive order doesn't even mention that proposed penalty…“Trump's real motivation came clear a day after his executive order, when his political action committee sent an email to supporters, citing the flag burned outside the White House while pleading with them to ‘pledge your patriotism now’ by sending him $35 to ‘claim’ a white T-shirt printed with an American flag.”
Chris Brennan, USA Today
“The president and his movement’s performative patriotism is defined by fealty to authority and idol worship of America-branded totems, like flags and statues. The things that truly make America great, like the Constitution — with its limits on executive power and broadly written rights to protect the citizenry’s liberty from an overbearing monarch — are seen as obstacles to Trump’s divinely inspired crusade to remake America into a country where dissent is crushed and checks on executive power no longer exist…
“Under the Constitution, the right to dissent, the right to worship (or not) and the right to express speech that some may perceive as offensive — like flag-burning or candid, fact-based discussions of some of the less-proud moments of American history — all take precedence over the snowflake-sensitive feelings of a performative patriot like Trump. Or at least, they used to. The future of our rights is still up in the air.”
Anthony L. Fisher, MSNBC
The right is divided about the executive order.
The right is divided about the executive order.
“Consider the implications of laws enhancing prosecution and penalties for selective speech. A liberal president could seek enhancements for views deemed hate speech or disinformation. Indeed, that is precisely the rationale used in other countries to selectively prosecute certain speech as ‘provocative,’ ‘offensive’ or fueling violence…
“This type of prosecution has swept across Europe, where free speech is in free fall. Europeans yielded to the desire to target particular viewpoints and speech, a move that quickly snowballed into massive censorship and criminalization of speech. That included arresting people praying to themselves near abortion clinics and any protests deemed offensive to various groups…
“Of course, the new order is a fight Trump likely believes he cannot lose. Even if he loses in court, he is seen as fighting a practice that remains uniformly unpopular with American voters. However, we should focus on defending the rights that define us as Americans. Free speech is the very right that distinguishes us from even close allies – the indispensable and quintessential American right. It would be a tragic irony to protect the symbol of our nation by destroying the core rights that symbol represents.”
Jonathan Turley, Fox News
Others argue, “All Trump’s executive order does is instruct federal law enforcement to vigorously enforce existing law when the underlying incident involves an American flag. That is perfectly appropriate, even laudatory, prosecutorial emphasis on law enforcement. At a time when Democratic prosecutors are going after children on scooters for driving over LGBT pride flags painted on the street, a Republican president has every right to remind the public what the symbols are that truly unite us as a people, not divide us.”
Editorial Board, Washington Examiner
“The special status of the flag—as the symbol of the nation and of the constitutional order that secures our liberty—has long made it an object of affection among the general population and derision on the radical fringes… In 2006, Pew reported, ‘Nearly three-in-four say flag burning should be illegal. Roughly half say it should be unconstitutional.’ In a June 2020 poll—at the height of progressive insanity—a plurality of Americans still said flag burning should be illegal…
“If Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader Mike Thune introduced [an amendment prohibiting desecrating the flag] (and they would, if Trump asked them to), they might scare up sufficient votes from more patriotic Democrats to advance the measure to the states. Failing that, they would put dozens of Democrats on the record as believing flag burning should not be banned… What better way to honor America’s upcoming semiquincentennial than with a rousing debate over the sanctity our flag?”
Charles Fain Lehman, City Journal
