Leftists Melt Down After Their Beloved ACLU Defends Trump: "Have You Been Hacked?'
The American Civil Liberties Union has driven a chasm into the ranks of former President Donald Trump’s opponents by supporting Meta’s plan to allow Trump back on Facebook and Instagram.
The decision was announced Wednesday in a blog post that noted some special conditions are attached to Trump’s return, which the blog post said will not be immediate.
As with all things Trump, the decision caused starkly different reactions on the political left and political right, with the ACLU breaking with other liberal groups to support the decision.
This is the right call. Like it or not, President Trump is one of the country’s leading political figures and the public has a strong interest in hearing his speech. https://t.co/PbY8AevFDy
— ACLU (@ACLU) January 26, 2023
“This is the right call. Like it or not, President Trump is one of the country’s leading political figures and the public has a strong interest in hearing his speech,” the ACLU posted on Twitter, engendering howls of outrage.
Some promised fiscal retribution.
“You will never receive another donation from me,” Stefanie Iris Weiss wrote.
“You are really testing my commitment to remaining a donor,” Kim Masters tweeted.
You’ve entirely lost the thread, you will never receive another donation from me
— Stefanie Iris Weiss (@EcoSexuality) January 26, 2023
You are really testing my commitment to remaining a donor.
— Kim Masters (@kimmasters) January 26, 2023
Others were just baffled and angry.
“Have you been hacked?” asked Aimee Carrero.
Have…you been hacked?
— Aimee Carrero (@aimeecarrero) January 26, 2023
There are other venues for him to speak. Surprised by your saying this.
— roxane gay (@rgay) January 26, 2023
Absolute bollocks
— Stop sniveling and do something. (@GregProops) January 26, 2023
The statement for the ACLU was consistent with a May 6, 2021, post on its website in which the ACLU made no bones about the extent to which it condemned Trump, but said Facebook had become a villain by banning him.
“Facebook exercises quasi-monopoly power over a critical forum in our marketplace of ideas, and for many of the same reasons that we would be suspicious of a central government authority controlling what can and cannot be said, we have concerns with Facebook exercising such unchecked power,” it wrote then.
While slamming Trump’s post-Capitol incursion speech as “pernicious,” The ACLU wrote that “the decisions by Facebook and other social media companies to remove Trump from their platforms highlight the immense power these corporations wield over our collective ability to speak online.”
“Facebook and similar platforms should err on the side of free expression, not censorship, while also offering users direct control over the content they see. Facebook effectively determines the boundaries of political speech for billions of users, even as it remains beholden to its bottom line, not the public interest,” the ACLU wrote then, adding that the rules it applied to Trump were based on a “disturbingly nebulous and far-reaching standard.”
The ACLU wrote that “political speech deserves the greatest protection to ensure the functioning of our democratic system. We have parted company with other advocacy organizations that have been more willing to limit the speech of political leaders on social media platforms.”
“The ACLU believes that the speech of former President Trump should be presumed important to the functioning of our democratic system given his prior role in government. Most of what politicians and political leaders say is, by definition, newsworthy, and can at times have legal or political consequences. While their words may have greater capacity for harm, there is also a greater public interest in having access to their speech,” the ACLU wrote then.
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