Gavin Newsom is calling out the Trump administration’s shifting tone on the First Amendment—by drawing on Stephen Miller’s own past words.
Concerns that the Trump administration is moving to clamp down on free speech deepened this week when ABC pulled Jimmy Kimmel Live! after FCC chair Brendan Carr threatened to revoke its broadcasting license over the comedian’s comments on Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
On Thursday, President Donald Trump complained that most TV networks “give me only bad publicity” and said they should “maybe” have their licenses “taken away.”
Meanwhile, Miller has launched a crusade against left-leaning political organizations in the wake of Kirk’s killing, calling them “a vast domestic terror movement.”
On Thursday, Newsom unearthed an X post from over three years ago where Miller wrote: “If the idea of free speech enrages you — the cornerstone of democratic self-government — than [sic] I regret to inform you that you are a fascist.”
The California governor shared the post along with a sardonic comment: “Good to know, @StephenM.”
Miller’s April 15 2022 comment came the same day Elon Musk unveiled his controversial $43 billion bid for Twitter (now X), claiming he wanted to build an “arena for free speech.”
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told the Daily Beast: “Left-wing organizations have fueled violent riots, organized attacks against law enforcement officers, coordinated illegal doxing campaigns, arranged drop points for weapons and riot materials, and more. The Trump Administration will get to the bottom of this vast network inciting violence in American communities. It is disingenuous and false for Democrats to say Administration actions are about free speech – they’re not. This effort will target those committing criminal acts and hold them accountable.”
Following the news of Kimmel’s show being pulled, Newsom issued several warnings about the state of free speech.
“There is no such thing as free speech under Donald Trump’s reign,” Newsom posted on X.
He also called out Republicans for “censoring” Americans “in real time.” Newsom wrote: “Buying and controlling media platforms. Firing commentators. Canceling shows. These aren’t coincidences. It’s coordinated. And it’s dangerous. The @GOP does not believe in free speech.”
Earlier this week, Newsom painted Miller as a looming threat to democratic norms.
After Miller announced Monday that the Trump administration would use “every resource” to “destroy” what he called left-wing “terrorist networks,” the Democratic governor wrote on X, “Wake up America.”
He attached a Fox News clip of Miller ranting about how the Democratic Party is “not a political party” but a “domestic extremist organization.”
“Stephen Miller has already publicly labeled the Democratic Party as a terrorist organization,” the governor wrote. “This isn’t about crime and safety. It’s about dismantling our democratic institutions. We cannot allow acts of political violence to be weaponized and used to threaten tens of millions of Americans.”
Late Wednesday, Trump said he would designate “Antifa,” the decentralized political movement he has railed against since his first term in office, as a terrorist organization.
That prompted Democratic strategist David Axelrod to warn on CNN that the country had arrived at an “inflection moment.”
“This is gonna be a major effort to try and defund any opposition in this country by doing it under this rubric of ‘Antifa’ and the radical left,” Axelrod said.
