The state makes an argument that speech can be part of a crime and that, says Heritage Senior Legal Fellow John Malcolm, is not so remarkable. "If I walk up to someone and intimidate them and say 'Your money or your life' then clearly I am committing a crime and I have used speech, but what speech was President Trump using here?" Malcolm asks. "He was filing lawsuits. He was using the bully pulpit. He was using social media to question the outcome of the election and whether he had been deprived of a victory through fraud. He spoke to legislators, asking them to look into the matter." The First Amendment, Malcolm said, protects free speech, particularly political speech and the rights of citizens to petition public officials for a redress of grievances.
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FBI agents early Friday raided the home of former National Security Advisor John Bolton as part of an investigation into a national security matter, U.S. officials told Just the News.
FBI Director Kash Patel hinted at the action in a cryptic post on his X social media account.
“NO ONE is above the law… FBI agents on mission,” Patel wrote.
Officials said the search of Bolton’s home involved a national security case that began under the Biden administration, but wasn’t aggressively pursued until Patel took over earlier this year. They declined to be more specific.
Bolton was one of several national security advisers for Trump, but was eventually fired and became a critic of the current president and Patel's nomination as FBI Director.
Earlier this year, Trump pulled Bolton's security clearance and Secret Service protection, drawing objections from some GOP senators like Tom Cotton of Arkansas.
After that action, Bolton eerily predicted he might face further action from Patel's FBI.
"I think the central characteristic Trump seems to be looking for in all of the appointees we’ve seen so far is fealty to him," he told the Christian Science Monitor in January. "A lot of people say it’s loyalty. Loyalty is a virtue, it’s a good thing. That’s not what Trump wants. He wants fealty to him. He wants submissiveness. He wants yes-men and yes-women. And Kash Patel has demonstrated, in his service in Trump’s first term, that he’ll simply do whatever Trump wants.
In response to a question in the interview about Patel, he said: "I don’t think he’s qualified," Bolton told the Christian Science Monitor "And if there is a retribution campaign, and there certainly seems to be, he would be a central element of it. I think that’s dangerous."