The First Amendment from the U.S. Constitution states:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Free speech. Press. Peacebly assemble. This a right we ALL have as Americans.
Except if you piss off the White House by responding to a verbal attack by a Nazi. Then you lose your right to free speech. Or so the White House has decided.
Here is the story. In mid-July, following the infamous Social Media (Hate) Summit of 2019, there was a fun little party outside the White House where elite members of social media, led by Joy Villa (MAGA Dress Girl) and Seb Gorka, taunted and insulted members of the White House press corps. You know, like twitter trolling, but in real life. Karem and Gorka got into a little war of words. Nothing big, just some back and forth twitter taunts, but said out loud.
Fast forward 2 weeks. The Washington Post is reporting that Karem was notified late on Friday that his press pass is being suspended for 30 days. Karem calls it an “anti-First Amendment move.” The suspension will reportedly begin on Monday.
Karem told the Washington Post that the White House told him the suspension was "related to his actions in the Rose Garden nearly a month ago, where he infamously sparred with former White House aide Sebastian Gorka."
The White House states that Karem “failed to abide by basic norms of decorum and order” on July 11th. They also referred to Gorka as a "guest of the President" but failed to mention that he is a trolling nazi fake doctor, but that's just parsing words. Karem rightfully questions the motive and thinks the suspension is most likely related to his tough questioning of Trump, similar to the suspension Jim Acosta got after his frequent sparring with Trump earlier this year.
Karem had strong words for the White House: “The President of the United States is responsible to answer our questions, and he doesn’t want to answer tough questions, and neither does anyone in this administration. I am going to continue to ask questions and continue to do my job.”
Playboy had this response:
