Trump-Champion of Free Speech!

Trump-Champion of Free Speech!

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On paper, Donald Trump is suddenly the patron saint of the First Amendment. Day one of term two, January 20, 2025, he signed Executive Order 14149, “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship.” Cue the patriotic music.

He declares that government censorship of Americans’ speech is dead and buried, replaced by a new golden age of “unfettered expression.” The press releases brag about liberating the public from meddlesome bureaucrats and Silicon Valley overlords. The order even tells the attorney general to comb through the past four years, hunting down every dusty file where some agency dared to “control speech.” On the surface, it sounds like he’s taking a sledgehammer to the gag orders.

But here’s the problem…

At nearly the same moment, Trump was wrapping himself in the First Amendment, his administration quietly slid a clause into FEMA’s $1.9 billion disaster-prep funding: if your state or city wanted the money, you had to swear you wouldn’t boycott Israeli companies.

It didn’t matter if those companies were operating out of illegal settlements in occupied Palestinian territory. You could have just been flattened by a hurricane, no loyalty pledge, no federal help. So much for “free speech.” In Trump’s America, you can call the president a criminal and post QAnon memes about lizard people, but if you criticize Israel or take part in the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement? Suddenly, your rights have fine print.

Once journalists exposed it, DHS scrambled like a teenager caught with a beer can, deleting the clause and insisting it never happened. But we all saw it. The message came through crystal clear: “You can say whatever you want, just not that.”

This isn’t a one-off. Trump has gone after entire countries for daring to criticize Israel. When Ireland considered a law to ban goods from Israeli settlements, settlements deemed internationally illegal, goods produced on stolen Palestinian land, Trump’s allies in Congress threatened to put the country on a U.S. boycott list.

A delegation was sent to Dublin to “discuss trade consequences,” which is polite diplomatic code for “Nice economy you’ve got there, shame if something happened to it.”

Don’t forget the campus protests.

As students across the U.S. set up encampments to call out Israel’s genocide in Gaza, Trump didn’t respond with some poetic ode to free expression. He sent in riot cops, the National Guard, and in some cases, actual active military personnel to drag kids off the quad for holding a cardboard sign that made the wrong people uncomfortable.

Apparently, the First Amendment ends at the edge of a Palestinian flag.

Trump’s “free speech” crusade is a loyalty test dressed up in red, white, and blue. The government will defend your right to speak until the moment your words inconvenience the donors, lobbyists, or foreign governments at the top of the influence food chain.

Back in Trump’s first term, he went after Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the rule that keeps social media companies from getting sued over what users post. The sales pitch? Stop “censorship” of conservatives online. The reality? A clumsy power play to scare platforms into letting conspiracy theories, disinformation, and frothing-at-the-mouth extremism run free, while still keeping a nice little pressure valve so the government could crack down on any speech that stepped on the wrong political toes. The pattern is the same now as it was then: wrap the crackdown in “free speech” branding, target your enemies, and protect your allies.

Free speech under Trump is a gated community. Sure, you can speak your mind, so long as you stay on the HOA-approved list of topics. Gaza isn’t on it. Israel is above it. And your disaster funding, your trade deals, even your right to protest can all be revoked the second you forget who you’re really not allowed to offend.