“He’s going to be very forceful, but he understands the role of the press,” Spicer said.
Sean Spicer, Donald Trump’s pick for press secretary, rushed to his new boss’ defense on Friday, contending that the president-elect is a “champion” of First Amendment rights.
“I mean look at his use of the First Amendment, he loves the First Amendment,” Spicer said with a laugh on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
Many have expressed concern that Trump is intent on weakening the First Amendment due to his assaults on the “dishonest media,” cries many of his supporters have echoed.
Trump blacklisted nearly a dozen news organizations from his rallies by the end of his campaign, and he promised to “open up our libel laws” so it would be easier to sue news outlets.
Time Warner CEO: Democrats, not Trump, Threatened First Amendment
Speaking to the Business Insider IGNITION conference in New York City, Bewkes pointed out that the Democratic Party “had a campaign plank to change the First Amendment, and they were doing it in the guise of campaign finance reform.”
Indeed, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton ran on an explicit pledge to change the First Amendment in order to overturn the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, which held that free speech extended to unions and corporations.
American Gut Check
But this dangerous man is incapable of bottling up his dark self for a full 90 minutes. And in the end, he finally crosses the one political barrier he had yet to fully cross — trashing democracy itself, we the people.
.. The remaining enablers — Reince Priebus, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Pence — had to know that things were bad when the Republican presidential nominee was tougher on the sainted Ronald Reagan than on the Russian strongman, Vladimir Putin.
.. And they had to know the game was over when another 3 a.m. tweet was blasted out by Trump, with his conclusion that he won, because of online polls that could not pass the vetting of Baghdad Bob.
.. He’s become a very tired and confused 70-year-old man feeding nuts to squirrels in the park of his delusions.
.. Steve Bannon, the former head of a fabulist, far-right website — Breitbart. Bannon is not much of a Republican.
.. “I’m a Leninist,” he said in a conversation recounted by Ronald Radosh in The Daily Beast. “Lenin wanted to destroy the state, and that’s my goal, too. I want to bring everything crashing down and destroy all of today’s establishment.”
.. His debate-night threat, holding the validity of the election itself hostage, is no surprise. Trump is bereft of patriotism, and seems to hate the country he wants to lead. He’s been talking down this nation and its most cherished institutions throughout his campaign. Time and again, he would rather defend Russia than the United States.
.. He’s gone after free speech — that would be the right granted in the amendment just before the only one he knows — threatening his enemies in the press. That same first amendment ensures that a religious test will not be used to judge us — another thing he has thrown to the side.
.. But in the final debate, his true persona was there for all to see — a self-hating American.
Washington Post Is Latest News Outlet Barred by Trump
.. effectively prohibiting journalists from one of the nation’s largest newspapers from joining the traveling press corps of the presumptive Republican nominee.
Barring journalists is an almost unheard-of practice for a modern presidential candidate. The Post is the latest major news organization that Mr. Trump has barred from his rallies and events this year, following Politico, BuzzFeed News, The Huffington Post and others.
.. he has been known to criticize reporters, then meet with them cordially shortly afterward.
.. Journalists without credentials can attend Trump events by obtaining tickets available to the general public. But a Politico reporter, Ben Schreckinger, said he was ejected from a Trump rally in California earlier this month by a campaign staff member and a private security guard.