Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) delivered an impassioned speech against a constitutional amendment allowing Congress to regulate campaign finance and slammed Democrats for attempting to “muzzle” the free speech rights of those across the political spectrum.
Cruz spoke out against Democrats for supporting the constitutional amendment introduced by Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), which would give Congress power to oversee the spending and raising of campaign money and overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday.
“Where are the liberals today?” Cruz asked. “Why is there not a liberal standing here defending the Bill of Rights and the First Amendment?”
In his fiery plea, the Tea Party darling went on to list a host of groups that support Democrats, including Planned Parenthood, the Sierra Club and the NAACP, that would be silenced if the amendment passed.
“Forty-two Democrats have signed their name to a constitutional amendment that would give Congress the power to muzzle Planned Parenthood and the National Right to Life,” he said. “Forty-two Democrats have signed their name to giving Congress the right to muzzle the Sierra Club, to muzzle the National Rifle Association and the Brady Center for Handgun Violence. To muzzle Michael Moore and Dinesh D’Souza. To muzzle the teamsters and the National Education Association. To muzzle the NAACP. To muzzle the Anti-Defamation League. To muzzle pastors and priests and rabbis who organize their parishioners to be involved in politics.”
Cruz warned that if the constitutional amendment passed, Congress would be allowed to ban books and movies, and noted that Ray Bradbury “would be astonished” by the actions of Democrats today who are acting like the firemen in his dystopian novel “Fahrenheit 451.”
The Texas conservative also expressed his frustration in the pages of the Wall Street Journal, where he penned an op-ed criticizing Udall’s proposed amendment.
“For centuries the Supreme Court has rightly concluded that free speech includes writing and distributing pamphlets, putting up billboards, displaying yard signs, launching a website, and running radio and television ads,” Cruz wrote. “Every one of those activities requires money. Distributing the Federalist Papers of Thomas Paine’s ‘Common Sense’ required money. If you can prohibit spending money, you can prohibit virtually any form of effective speech.”
While it is unlikely Udall’s amendment will be passed, Cruz still criticized Democrats for attempting to stifle free speech.
“Still, it’s a reflection of today’s Democratic disrespect of free speech that an attempt would even be made,” he wrote. “There was a time, not too long ago, when free speech was a bipartisan commitment.”
h/t Free Beacon
