Use the Constitution to Protect the Constitution
Plus: Let’s Not Boost the Campus Speech Police
Recently in The Bulwark:
CHARLIE SYKES: Deplorables of the Year, Part II
SONNY BUNCH: ‘Godzilla Minus One’ Review and Why Is WB Hiding that ‘Wonka’ Is a Musical?
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ALSTON RAMSAY: Use the Constitution to Protect the Constitution.
ONE OF THE MANY CASUALTIES of Donald Trump’s chaotic, never-ending assault on reality is our collective ability to call a spade a spade. The challenge to Trump’s eligibility to be president under the Fourteenth Amendment, Section 3 of which bans insurrectionists who previously swore an oath to support the Constitution from ever holding state or federal office again, is a case in point. With all that we now know about Trump’s actions leading up to and on January 6, 2021, it should be clear that he engaged in insurrection and thus is constitutionally barred from office. (If you want to get into the specifics of constitutional interpretation on this matter, check out this thorough treatment by Ilya Somin.) And yet, in the politosphere, the effort to disqualify Trump on a Fourteenth Amendment basis is widely regarded as a partisan “long shot,” and even many Trump detractors decry it on the grounds that Trumpism can only be defeated at the ballot box.
🎥 PODCASTS AND VIDEOS 🎧
Bulwark Podcast with Charlie Sykes: Ready for 2024? [Ad-Free🔐]
Secret Podcast: What if Good Things Happen? 🔐
Beg to Differ: “America Retreating from World Leadership” [Ad-Free🔐]
Thursday Night Bulwark: Biden’s Economy [Video] 🔐
ATMA 🎧: Dubs v Subs: The Great Debate 🔐
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CATHY YOUNG: Let’s Not Boost the Campus Speech Police.
AT THE END OF A WEEK of polemics over free speech, hate speech, and speech regulation, where do we stand? What, if anything, have we learned? And what might change?
The debates went into overdrive after the viral moment on December 6 when the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and MIT, during a congressional hearing on campus antisemitism, declined to say that a call for the genocide of Jews would necessarily violate their schools’ policies against harassment. Republicans—including Rep. Elise Stefanik, who led the questioning—seized on the administrators’ non-answers as evidence of moral deficiency, double standards, and outrageous connivance in antisemitism.
🚨OVERTIME🚨
Happy Friday! Santa is coming to my neighborhood on a firetruck tonight, as it is our local volunteer fire department’s tradition to collect donations. I just wanted to offer a special thanks to readers, not just for their generosity in supporting us, but the various causes we highlight here. We know that money does not grow on trees. Thank you for your generosity.
The Nutcracker… At the White House.
Pay up, Giuliani… A jury ordered the man formerly known as “America’s Mayor” by some to pay Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman nearly $150 million. He doesn’t have the money to pay in full, but good.
"Go Warren Buffett!"… is a sentence I never envisioned myself typing. (Jimmy Haslam, who is in a dispute with Buffett, is the hapless owner of the Cleveland Browns who are succeeding largely despite him.)
The mystery of the missing binder… How a collection of raw Russian intelligence disappeared under Trump.
Inside TRW… The Proper People went inside the old TRW HQ near where I grew up and it’s a shame about the fate of a beautiful, spooky building. (Would have made a great movie or TV set along the lines of Severance.)
AI can do your homework… Now what?
The “majority of the minority”… Has taken on new meaning in the Republican-"led" house.
Fighting Satan for Fame, Fortune, and Jesus, Or Something… An excellent read from Andrew Donaldson at Ordinary Times.
Scoring Oppenheimer… Behind the scenes.
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