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The “First Amendment/Meme” trial for Douglass Mackey started on Monday.

As most of you likely know by now, Mr. Mackey is facing up to 10 years in a federal prison for posting an anti-Hillary meme on Twitter back in 2016.

At the time, Mr. Mackey was an influential Trump supporter who tweeted under the handle “Ricky Vaughn.” His account was wildly popular and many experts credit him personally with helping President Trump win his long-shot election.

Revolver covered the story of this monumental “free speech” case in a bombshell article that highlighted why this is the most important First Amendment trial in the country.

You might not know much about Mackey’s case. It’s far less notorious than the January 6 prosecutions, or the murder trial of Kyle Rittenhouse. But in terms of how much the speech matters for American liberty, it is as important as either of those — perhaps more so.

In January 2021, shortly after the January 6 incident inaugurated a national anti-MAGA crackdown, the Department of Justice charged Mackey with “conspiring … to deprive individuals of their constitutional right to vote.”

Mackey’s offense? Illegal memes.

Specifically, the DOJ claims that the above meme merits a prison sentence of up to ten years, for violation of 18 U.S. Code § 241. The law, which concerns “Conspiracy against rights,” is a subset of the Enforcement Act of 1871, better known as the Ku Klux Klan Act.

The DOJ’s argument is that, by posting the above memes on Twitter in 2016, and designing it to resemble a Hillary Clinton ad, Mackey deceived the public into casting invalid text message votes, as part of a conspiracy to deprive them of the right to vote.

To be clear, the federal government can’t show that this actually happened. But the government says that proving a dumb meme fooled a single person is not necessary to find one guilty of the dastardly crime of disinformation.

Just last week a disturbing ruling revealed the Regime’s “playbook” and how aggressively they plan to go after Mr. Mackey.

What the government is doing is called “stochastic terrorism,” and Revolver explained exactly what that means:

Last fall, we warned about a new tool in the arsenal of weapons used by the regime to justify censorship and rolling back the basic rights of Americans. With this new tool, corrupt journalists like Taylor Lorenz can dox, harass, and lie about anyone they want and enjoy total immunity from criticism. Why? Well, if you dare to criticize a journalist like Lorenz, someone, somewhere, might become outraged and decide to commit an act of violence. With this remarkable censorship tool, the media’s attack dog journalists are magically absolved from any criticism because some nut job, somewhere, maybe, at sometime, might act violently upon this criticism.

The tool goes by the name “stochastic terrorism.”

Basically, “stochastic terrorism” is the idea that, when somebody on the right criticizes somebody, they aren’t really just making a political argument. Instead, they are trying to “stoke hatred” in the expectation that some random third party will be “radicalized” and then commit political violence on their behalf.

Biden’s DOJ is using “stochastic terrorism” to cancel due process.

[…]the Biden Department of Justice is using the logic of “stochastic terrorism” to justify stripping core constitutional due process rights from dissident American voices.

In its latest filings, the DOJ reveals that one of the group chats it is currently using as evidence against Mackey contained a person who is now working with the FBI as a federal informant. According to the government, the “Confidential Witness” (or CW) was a pro-Trump, “alt right” leader who pleaded guilty to the same conspiracy to deprive civil rights charges that Mackey faces, and is now collaborating with the government.

In its filings, the government declines to say what CW’s current role with the government is, except that he is “presently engaged in proactive investigations, working with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), and may engage in additional investigations in the future.” Based on that statement, the government is asking that CW’s identity be kept secret, and that Mackey’s defense team be barred from asking any questions about CW’s current work.

This is a much bolder request than it might seem to the legally uninitiated. The Sixth Amendment of the Bill of Rights guarantees the right of any criminal defendant to “be confronted with the witnesses against him.” Like most constitutional rights, this law is not absolute, but limitations to it have historically been very limited. Courts have long disallowed anonymous witnesses due to the Sixth Amendment, except in extreme circumstances involving violent, organized criminal organizations with the capacity to retaliate against witnesses and their families. And even then, courts have restricted the right to testify anonymously. For instance, in 2014, the U.S. 10th Circuit said this, about the possible danger of retaliation from the ruthless Salvadoran street gang MS-13.

“…a generalized statement about danger — such as anyone who testifies against one of [MS 13’s] members faces danger from [MS-13] — would be insufficient to show that a threat against a witness was actual and not a result of conjecture.” [United States v. Gutierrez de Lopez, 761 F.3d 1123, 1140 (10th Cir. 2014)]
But now, in the Mackey case, the Biden DOJ asserts that its witness’s identity must be hidden, because if not, he might face, wait for it… harassment on the Internet!

In addition, Darren Beattie appeared on War Room to further discuss the Mackey trial and “stochastic terrorism” with Steve Bannon:

Also, this viral thread provides intricate details on the case and some history on the “Ricky Vaughn” character.

The trial began on Monday in New York City, with both sides squaring off: The First Amendment vs The Biden Regime.

Many people are chiming in on the trial, including Joe Lonsdale, a successful entrepreneur who retweeted the viral thread, stating, “This sounds concerning.”

Indeed…

That tweet caught the eye of Elon Musk, and he responded to Joe’s comment and the viral thread, with a very simple, yet extremely powerful, “Yeah.”

That one word is all it takes for this important case to get a much-needed bright spotlight shining down on it.

And in another powerful turn of events, Douglass Mackey himself responded to Elon Musk, thanking him for bringing attention to his case.

You can support Mr. Mackey and this very important First Amendment by donating to his legal defense fund: memedefensefund.com

Or send crypto: DouglassMackey.Substack.com/p/crypto

Or GiveSendGo: GiveSendGo.com/douglassmackey

If you’re not familiar with this case, we encourage you to read the two Revolver pieces here and here. Also, please read the viral thread included in this article for additional information.

And don’t forget the power of prayer. Please pray for Douglass Mackey as he battles for free speech in the United States.

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