Republicans have taken a number of stark positions during this second Trump administration. But their hostility to free speech can be traced directly to the party’s standard-bearer, Donald Trump.
Still, there’s one position they won’t — can’t, actually — publicly admit: Trump really, really doesn’t respect the First Amendment. This has forced his administration into strange contortions to sanction speech that upsets him, without directly saying why.
As is so often the case with Trump, he tells a bit of the truth about this, while leaving out the inconvenient parts. The president has never shied away from saying he tends to like people who say nice things about him — he likes people “who like me” — whether that’s celebrities or world leaders.