This new Michigan ‘hate crime’ bill is ripe for abuse
Brad Polumbo
Democrats currently run the show in Michigan, with full control of the state legislature and governor’s mansion. They’re using that power while they have it — and are imperiling the First Amendment in the process.
The state House recently passed a “hate crime” bill that is ripe for abuse. It outlaws not just violence or vandalism, but also speech that makes people “feel frightened or threatened.”
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According to the law, “A person is guilty of a hate crime if that person maliciously … and intentionally does any of the following to an individual based in whole or in part on [a protected characteristic] … intimidates another individual.” (Emphasis added.)
That’s right: Intimidating another individual can land you up to two years in jail, a felony on your record, and a $5,000 fine. What does “intimidating” mean under this law?
Here’s how the bill describes it:
“‘Intimidate’ means a willful course of conduct involving repeated or continuing harassment of another individual that would cause a reasonable individual to feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened, and that actually causes the victim to feel terrorized, frightened, or threatened. Intimidate does not include constitutionally protected activity or conduct that serves a legitimate purpose.”
So, if you say something that makes someone “reasonable” feel “threatened” or “frightened,” that would be a crime. To call that overbroad is the understatement of the century — which is why Michigan Republicans aren’t on board.
“Threats and violence and things of that nature and protecting against crime is certainly something that we absolutely should be doing in Michigan. But we shouldn’t be building that around an individual’s feelings of being frightened,” Republican state Rep. Steve Carra told CBS News. “Scrap this bill. This is not a bill that we need for the state of Michigan.”
Even completely nonpartisan free speech watchdogs such as the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression have serious concerns about this legislation.
‘‘True threats’ are not protected speech, and therefore legitimately proscribable by the government,” FIRE Legislative Council Tyler Coward told me. “However, [the Michigan bill’s] inclusion of the word ‘frighten’ could render the statute unconstitutional.”
Coward further said that its vagueness “invites a tremendous amount of mischief” and added that “FIRE’s 24 years of defending free speech on campus show that overbroad and vague anti-discrimination and anti-harassment speech codes will almost inevitably be misused.”
Indeed, it will.
Supposedly “reasonable” organizations such as Lambda Legal now insist, “Pronouns aren’t preferred. They’re required.” The United Nations calls on governments to combat “hate speech.” Colleges claim “misgendering” someone is “an act of violence.” We can all see where this is going.
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So, if Michigan’s law passes, it might not be abused today. But it will almost certainly be abused at some point to punish people for simply saying things about hot-button issues that others don’t like.
That’s fundamentally un-American and unconstitutional. If Michigan Democrats advance this legislation and keep moving down this path, the courts should strike it down and rebuke their attack on our most basic freedoms.
Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is an independent journalist and the co-founder of BASEDPolitics.