He’s Going to Prison for Twitter Trolling. That’s Not Justice – By Bill Binion (Reason) / Oct 20, 2023
Douglass Mackey’s case raised questions about free speech, overcriminalization, and a politicized criminal legal system.
It took an FBI investigation, a three-week trial, and lots of taxpayer dollars, but the government finally got what it wanted this week: A Florida man is heading to federal prison for disseminating trollish memes during the 2016 election season that prosecutors alleged “deprive[d] people of their constitutional right to vote.”
In the months leading up to Election Day, Douglass Mackey, an erstwhile far-right social media influencer, posted a series of photos on his Twitter profile—which had about 58,000 followers under the name “Ricky Vaughn”—encouraging Hillary Clinton–supporters to cast their votes by phone. That obviously didn’t go so well for the people who fell for it. But however you feel about Mackey’s obnoxious brand of politics and feeble attempt at comedy, the case became about a lot more than him, raising questions about protected speech, overcriminalization, and a politicized Department of Justice.
To prosecute Mackey, the government leveraged a law from 1870, a century and change before Twitter trolling would become a sport. That legislation was passed to deter the Ku Klux Klan from trying to prevent black people from voting, as they were known to do. According to the indictment, the DOJ alleged Mackey conspired to “injure, oppress, threaten and intimidate one or more persons in the free exercise and enjoyment of a right and privilege secured to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States, to wit: the right to vote.”
CONTINUE > https://reason.com/2023/10/20/hes-going-to-prison-for-twitter-trolling-thats-not-justice/
