Free speech is under direct, frontal attack in the U.S.

Among the many constitutional transgressions by the Trump administration, this is the one that could change the face of American society. In the words of civil rights leader Frederick Douglass, “No right was deemed by the fathers of the Government more sacred than the right of speech ... That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They know its power.”

Americans so far don’t seem to likewise appreciate the stakes. Free speech means the freedom to think. Without the freedom to think, we lose what makes us human.

The Supreme Court has emphasized that the First Amendment enables “all persons ... to think and speak as they wish, not as the government demands.” The right to think and speak extends to government employees, too — with rare exceptions, the government is barred from “conditioning hiring decisions on political belief and association.” Nor can it retaliate against people for having engaged in “protected speech,” which prominently includes political messaging. The First Amendment forbids the federal government from using its massive financial, investigative and law enforcement powers “to punish or suppress disfavored expression.”

These basic premises of First Amendment law have gone out the window since Jan. 20, 2025.

Trump’s assault on the First Amendment was made explicit in numerous executive orders identifying what courts call “disfavored expression.” These include content implicating diversity,........

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