President Donald Trump issued an government order on Monday directing federal prosecutors to deliver legal prices in opposition to people who burn American flags throughout demonstrations.
The directive represents an effort to avoid constitutional protections established by the Supreme Court docket a long time earlier.
This transfer marks President Trump's newest try to limit what courts have beforehand recognised as protected speech below the First Modification.
The manager order directs Lawyer Basic Pam Bondi to look at situations the place people have burned flags and decide whether or not different legal prices might be pursued.
Federal prosecutors are instructed to discover potential violations of different statutes, together with disturbing the peace or breaching environmental rules.
This strategy makes an attempt to sidestep direct constitutional challenges by specializing in ancillary offences fairly than the act of flag burning itself.
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The order duties the Justice Division with reviewing present instances to establish prosecutable parts past the symbolic destruction of the flag.
The technique represents an oblique technique of criminalising flag burning while avoiding direct confrontation with established First Modification protections.
Talking from the Oval Workplace while signing the directive, President Trump expressed his frustration with flag burning incidents.
"All around the nation they're burning flags," the President said. "All of over the world they burn the American flag, and as you understand, by a really unhappy courtroom, I assume it was a 5-4 determination, they known as it freedom of speech."
President Trump additional argued that flag destruction provokes civil unrest. "However if you burn the American flag, it incites riots, at ranges we've by no means seen earlier than," he added.
The President has maintained this place for years, having beforehand advocated for extreme penalties together with potential lack of citizenship for flag burners.
The 1989 Supreme Court docket ruling in Texas v Johnson established flag burning as constitutionally protected political expression by a slender 5-4 determination.
This landmark case invalidated flag-burning laws throughout 48 states, cementing the appropriate to destroy flags as a type of political demonstration.
Public sentiment seems to align with Trump's place on this matter. YouGov polling from 2020 revealed practically half of Individuals favour criminalising flag destruction, while roughly one-third think about it acceptable behaviour.
Newer survey knowledge from September 2023 signifies rising opposition, with 59 per cent of Individuals now viewing flag burning throughout protests as "by no means" acceptable below any circumstances.