As conservative activists call attention to Wisconsinites they claim are celebrating the assassination of Charlie Kirk, Republican congressman Derrick Van Orden has introduced legislation to defund entities employing people “who condone and celebrate political violence and domestic terrorism.”
Free speech advocates say the bill is likely unconstitutional and the government shouldn’t decide which groups get federal funding based on employees’ private comments.
The proposal comes as conservatives have been sharing screenshots of social media posts from people they deem to be celebrating the murder of one of the most prominent voices on the political right.
In Wisconsin, a child care employee in Milwaukee was fired for posting, “If all you do is spew hate, you’re bound to get some in return.” A teacher at the Rosendale-Brandon School District was placed on administrative leave for calling Kirk a “racist” and “white nationalist mouthpiece” who profited off of inciting hatred. The School District of Cudahy announced it is reviewing the actions of an employee who wrote “Karma is rough” following Kirk’s assassination.
In Eau Claire, an online petition is calling for two city council members to resign for their posts, one of which includes a quote from Kirk about gun deaths and another that called Kirk a “sick man who has been cut down by the very rhetoric he spewed.”
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Van Orden, a Republican from Prairie du Chien who represents the city, responded to the posts on the social media site X, stating he has worked to get millions of dollars for Eau Claire.
“We’re having a meeting today to figure out how to make that stop if this is not rectified immediately,” Van Orden said. “Federal dollars will not be going to support communities that have hate mongers celebrating the assassination of American citizens in their leadership.”
The same day, Van Orden introduced a bill to block federal funding “for entities that employ individuals who condone and celebrate political violence and domestic terrorism.” As of Tuesday afternoon, no other U.S. House members had signed on to the legislation.
Eau Claire City Council President Emily Berge, who is running as a Democrat against Van Orden for the state’s 3rd Congressional District, said the assassination of Kirk should not have happened and has traumatized his family and supporters. She said she’s heard from a lot of angry people who want her fellow council members fired, but because they’re elected officials, “that is not how that works.”
“I think it’s really unfortunate that he is threatening his constituents, the City of Eau Claire and the 74,000 people that live in Eau Claire,” Berge said. “He’s using his position of power as a bully.”
Berge said she can’t control what fellow council members say, but they were exercising their First Amendment rights when they posted.
Attorneys focused on free speech cases say Van Orden bill likely unconstitutional
Rick Esenberg, who founded the conservative Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, told WPR Van Orden’s bill amounts to “an allegedly unconstitutional condition.” He said the law dictating how government funding is directed is confusing.
“But as a general rule, we don’t want the government to be making the receipt of federal funds contingent on an exercise of speech which is really unrelated to the government’s purposes in providing the funding,” Esenberg said. “So, I think it’s highly problematic because the First Amendment does protect speech that most of us would find disgusting and reprehensible.”
Carolyn Iodice is the legislative and policy director for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, or FIRE. She said the First Amendment protects Americans’ free speech rights very broadly, with a few narrowly drawn expectations.
Iodice said there are also important distinctions between what private and public employers can do regarding employees’ comments. Private employers, she said, have more leeway to fire people who make comments they object to. Iodice said the U.S. Supreme Court has said public employees can be fired for comments they make “within the scope of your public employment,” but if a person speaks as a private citizen, it gets more complicated.
“I can’t say categorically that those firings of public employees would or wouldn’t be constitutional, but the First Amendment does protect a lot of speech from public employees when they’re speaking in their private capacity that way,” Iodice said.
US Attorney General walks back vow to target ‘hate speech’ amid bipartisan backlash
During an appearance on a podcast Monday night, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the U.S. Department of Justice “will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech. And that’s across the aisle.” Bondi’s comments were quickly rebuked by free speech advocacy groups like FIRE and WILL.
Iodice told WPR the attempt to differentiate free speech from hate speech is “very alarming” — and the Constitution doesn’t allow it.
“The First Amendment does not make exceptions for hate speech,” Iodice said. “And if it did, then government officials could just decide something is hateful and ban it. That would just open the door to an enormous amount of censorship.”
In a post on X Tuesday, Bondi walked back the comments by clarifying hate speech “that crosses the line into threats of violence is NOT protected by the First Amendment.”
“It’s a crime,” Bondi said. “For far too long, we’ve watched the radical left normalize threats, call for assassinations, and cheer on political violence. That era is over.”
Esenberg told WPR Bondi’s initial comments were “flat out wrong” and he “wasn’t happy” with the walk back either.
“What we regard as a true threat under the law would be intentional or reckless conduct by the speaker that the object of the threat reasonably interpreted as a threat to do harm to them,” Esenberg said.
Conservatives have pointed to some comments following Kirk’s assassination from what they allege are liberal social media users calling for other prominent speakers on the right, and even President Donald Trump, to be next. Esenberg says comments like that are “disgusting” and “reprehensible.”
“Does it rise to the level of a true threat?” Esenberg said. “It kind of depends on the circumstances, but I think you need more than those words.”
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