One would think at the late date of 2019, people would know a) you can’t just talk offhand about wanting to see a United States president assassinated, and b) anything you say on the internet isn’t private. But one woman in ultra-progressive San Antonio, Texas was lit up with righteous indignation that her comments online would get her a visit from not only the San Antonio police but also the Secret Service.
The anonymous woman starts recording a video of the encounter when SAPD and the Secret Service show up at her door.
‘I made comments online so the secret service came to my door with an SAPD that works with them,” the woman says in the video.
Um, yes, lady. That’s how seriously the Secret Service takes their job of protecting the president.
The Secret Service protects the President of the United States, regardless of whether they agree with his politics.
After asking what she said online that warranted a visit to her home, the agent quotes from his paperwork, “Can someone shoot the fool between the eyes…”
“So what you’re saying is that I don’t have freedom of speech,” the woman interrupts, indignantly. “I can’t say what I want to? Is that the concern?”
“Did I commit a crime by expressing what I said,” she asks.
It’s hard not to just stare mutely at people who think such illogical things, let alone write them down on a social platform. Any thinking person knows her freedom of speech was not being attacked in any way. They also know there are limits to free speech.
Incitement to violence is an exception to the First Amendment.
And asking if someone can shoot any president in the head fits under that heading.
Regardless, the SAPD officer and Secret Service agent remain calm and inform the woman that they are simply following up after she made her comment online — which is their job — and that she could decline to be interviewed, which she does.
The ignorance of the law, as well as the indignation to being questioned after making comments online, is utterly astounding.
In America, we love our freedom of speech. But that right comes with the responsibility to not call for anyone to be hurt. We may say things flippantly at times and on the internet, it is often all too easy to go too far. Hopefully, after the shock and anger over the visit wore off, the woman came to her senses and took this as a lesson in how to use her words more responsibly online.