The Daily Beast reports:
A source on the call, who shared it with The Daily Beast, called Trump’s talk “unhinged” noting that it often veered off in various directions. At one point, the source said, the president brought up flag burning and encouraged states to pass laws banning it.
“Flag burning is a disgrace. We have a different court. And i think that It’s time to review that again,” he said.
“They wanted to climb up flag polls in Washington in order to burn flags, but we stopped them. If you wanted to try and pass a very powerful flag burning statute, anti-flag burning, I hope you do it because we will back you 100 percent, all the way. I hope some of you do it.”
The President of the United States believes a solution to a week of chaos is… to bring back flag-burning laws. No, seriously. https://t.co/UBlJ04MocL
— Noah Shachtman (@NoahShachtman) June 1, 2020
Trump urged gov to pass laws outlawing flag burning, saying SCOTUS’ decision to uphold it as protected speech was “against what a lot of people want.”
“We have a different court and I think that it’s time to review that again… I hope you do it because we’ll back you 100%”
— Jordan Fabian (@Jordanfabian) June 1, 2020
Trump told governors that he wants to criminalize flag burning. But, as Politico notes, two Supreme Court cases — Texas v. Johnson in 1989 and U.S. v. Eichman in 1990 — have found flag burning is protected under the First Amendment.
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 1, 2020