Rep. Lead House general manager Jamie Raskin, D-Md., Said former President Trump’s lawyers’ argument that Trump was within his rights for the first amendment when he made election fraud claims was a ‘completely irrelevant inference’ .
“The whole smokescreen of the First Amendment is a completely irrelevant distraction from the standard of high crimes and transgressions regarding a president who violated his oath of office,” Raskin, a constitutional lawyer, argued in the Senate floor on Thursday.
“The instigation of a violent uprising is not protected by freedom of speech,” he said.
“Now he is arguing that Congress is violating his speech rights when Donald Trump fueled an uprising against us that stopped speech and debate on the floor of the House and Senate during the peaceful transfer of power.”
Trump’s lawyers argued in their preliminary injunction Monday that Trump’s false allegations that the election was ‘stolen’ were within his rights for the first amendment, and he made no reference to physical violence.
TRUMP LEGAL ARGUES PROTECTION ARTICLE IS IN ‘BREACH’ OF THE CONSTITUTION
“Mr. Trump spoke for about one hour and fifteen minutes. Of the more than 10,000 words spoken, Mr. Trump used the word ‘fight’ a little more than a handful of times and each time in the figurative sense that “has long been accepted in public discourse when they urge people to stand up and use their voices to hear about issues that are important to them; it was not and could not be interpreted to encourage violence,” is said in the letter.
It continues: ‘Remarkably absent in his speech was any reference to or encouragement of an uprising, a riot, criminal action or any acts of physical violence whatsoever … Mr. Trump never mentioned any explicit or implied mention of weapons, the need for weapons, or anything like that. Instead, he simply appealed to those gathered to use their voices peacefully and patriotically. ‘
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In addition to their argument for the first amendment, Trump’s attorneys Bruce Castor and Doug Schoen will begin their defense Friday, arguing that the entire process is “unconstitutional, bad public policy and sets a bad precedent for the country,” Castor told Fox News .