Legal Expert Says Latest Trump Indictments Criminalize Protected Speech
Former President Donald Trump and his political allies have denounced each of the four recent indictments against him as part of a government conspiracy to hobble the campaign of President Joe Biden’s likeliest challenger in next year’s presidential race.
In light of the recent federal charges and subsequent Georgia indictment related to Trump’s skepticism about the outcome of the 2020 election, however, a growing number of legal experts are weighing in with their own thoughts about the troubling precedent they appear to set.
Former deputy independent counsel Sol Wisenberg appeared on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle” this week to denounce both indictments as “very dangerous” steps toward transforming constitutionally protected speech into prosecutable crimes.
“What is so disturbing about these two indictments, D.C. and Georgia, is how much traditionally protected political speech is referenced in these indictments and is considered to be part of criminal activity,” he said.
Among the 19 people included in the Georgia indictment is former Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Clark, whom Wisenberg said “absolutely believed the election was stolen” in the aftermath of President Joe Biden’s declared victory.
“Why is that important?” he asked. “It’s important because you have to have a certain level of intent. Throughout this indictment, there are allegations that people knowingly stated lies, stated falsehoods. But, more importantly, in terms of the charges against President Trump, you have got Jeffrey Clark.”
Clark was not only nominated by then-President Trump and confirmed by the Senate, but he was also a highly respected legal scholar who was “telling the president that the election has been stolen and that the Department of Justice can do something about that.”
Trump offered his assessment of the Georgia indictment — and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis — a short time after news of the latest charges broke.
“Nineteen people were indicted, and the whole world is laughing at the United States as they see how corrupt and horrible a place it has turned out to be under the leadership of Crooked Joe Biden,” he said.
He went on to call Willis “racist and corrupt,” claiming that she is fundraising off of the charges against him and has been responsible for turning the county into “a murder capital of the world with among the highest violent crime levels anywhere in our country.”
