E. Tenn. Democrat, Holder Justice Department challenged on outreach program said to enforce Sharia
Reacting to reports that the Obama Department of Justice may prosecute those who write and post articles offensive to Muslims, Pamela Geller of the American Freedom Defense Initiative has vowed, “We will fight you on this every step of the way. We will drag your dhimmi asses all the way to the Supreme Court. This is Sharia enforcement, and we are not going to stand for it.”
The term “dhimmi” refers to submission to or enforcement of Islamic law, also called Sharia.
Pamela Geller.
Geller, who also co-founded Stop Islamization of Nations (SION) with Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch, has endorsed a rally for free speech on June 4 in Manchester, Tennessee, to protest anti-free speech comments by Bill Killian, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee.
Killian has generated outrage by vowing to use federal civil rights laws to punish those making critical comments about Islam.
In a story on the controversy, Politico quotes Floyd Abrams, one of the country’s most respected First Amendment attorneys, as saying about Killian: “He’s just wrong. The government may, indeed, play a useful and entirely constitutional role in urging people not to engage in speech that amounts to religious discrimination. But it may not, under the First Amendment, prevent or punish speech even if it may be viewed as hostile to a religion. And what it most clearly may not do is to stifle political or social debate, however rambunctious or offensive some may think it is.”
A local paper reports that Killian and Kenneth Moore, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Knoxville, Tennessee, Division, are speaking at a public event and “will provide input on how civil rights can be violated by those who post inflammatory documents targeted at Muslims on social media.”
A U.S. Attorney usually prosecutes offenses such as foreign terrorism, child pornography, violent crimes and drug trafficking. But Killian told the local paper that civil rights laws can have certain “consequences” for the First Amendment right of free speech. The paper said, “Killian said Internet postings that violate civil rights are subject to federal jurisdiction.”
No comments:
Post a Comment