Donald Trump Knows First Amendment Just As Good As He Knows Mexicans

Humungous bag of weasel smegma Donald Trump is suing Univision for $500 million because it canceled its coverage of the Miss Universe pageant after his really smart (and totally accurate, he says) analysis of Mexicans, who are "bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists." Some, he figures, are "good people," so he doesn't even see why everyone's having a hissy fit, he's covered that. And who knows, depending on the details of the contract, he might even have a case against the network. Oh, but it turns out that the lawsuit isn't just about breach of contract. No, this is Donald Trump, so he had to go Full Palin and accuse the network of trying to stifle his FREE SPEACH. 

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A statement from the Trump Organization (we always hear the "Imperial March" from Star Wars when we see that name) says, in part:

Under the contract, Univision is required to broadcast the pageant live on television in Spanish. While Univision claims its decision came solely in response to comments by Mr. Trump during a June 16 campaign speech announcing his candidacy for President of the United States, the decision was, in reality, a politically motivated attempt to suppress Mr. Trump's freedom of speech under the First Amendment as he begins to campaign for the nation's presidency

Hey, we think we might have spotted a problem right there! You see, Donald, when a broadcast corporation and its content providers love each other very much, God blesses them with Programming, and it is good. If the content provider says something that you'd expect to come from the mouthparts of David Duke, and the broadcasting corporation says "Look, pendejo, we will not broadcast your content anymore, you pinche cabrón ," the content provider may sue for a violation of the terms of the contract, but the First Amendment simply don't enter into it. We've been over this with those Duck People already, don'tcha know? The only entities that can violate your First Amendment rights are government agencies, and despite the press release, we're pretty sure the Trump Organization is fully aware of that, and is just making Free Speach noise because it thinks muddying the waters might help somehow.

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Univision spokeswoman Monica Talan emailed Politico with a statement suggesting that the network wasn't especially scared of the bloated shoutyman:

“We just reviewed Mr. Trump’s complaint for the first time, and it is both factually false and legally ridiculous. We will not only vigorously defend the case, but will continue to fight against Mr. Trump’s ongoing efforts to run away from the derogatory comments he made on June 16th about Mexican immigrants. Our decision to end our business relationship with Mr. Trump was influenced solely by our responsibility to speak up for the community we serve.”

We took a quick look at the actual complaint in Trump's lawsuit, assuming that maybe the First Amendment stuff was only in the press release, but no, the complaint makes that claim too, at one point in its summary of events stating that "Univision's attempt to suppress Mr. Trump's First Amendment rights and defame his image did not end there." Free Speech isn't mentioned in the actual "causes of action" part of the complaint, so that reference to the First Amendment is nothing more than a cute, pointless rhetorical flourish; even so, it's bullshit of the highest order, and we hope that a judge will at least give Trump's attorneys a withering glance for it.

In short (or in short-fingered vulgarian), Trump's free speech whining is mostly just a lot of noise for consumption on Fox News, not really part of his lawsuit, which we're betting will be quietly settled, especially since Trump acknowledges in the complaint that Univision agreed up front to pay his organization the $13.5 million licensing fee for the Miss Universe pageant. As for any claim of defamation in the case, we're guessing that no judge on the planet would find that anyone could possibly do more damage to Donald Trump's image than he already has himself.

[ NPR / Politico / Miss Universe L.P., LLLP v. Univision Networks on Scribd ]