The Soft Totalitarianism of the Political Class

Officials pursue an anti-liberty agenda through unofficial pressure and foreign regulators.

It's no secret that governments around the world are chiseling away at people's liberties. Rights advocates document a nearly two decade decline in freedom. Civil liberties activists warn of a worldwide free speech recession. And while American restrictions on government power hold the line better than pale equivalents elsewhere, the political class seems determined to end-run those protections and impose creeping totalitarianism by leveraging the authority of allies in other countries.

U.S. Politicians Give Thanks to Foreign Censors

"Obrigado Brasil!" Keith Ellison, Minnesota's attorney general, wrote this week to thank that country's authoritarian Supreme Court for its recent ban on the X social media platform.

The court demanded X censor political views it called "disinformation" and appoint a new legal representative to receive court orders—after threatening the previous one with arrest. Importantly, the ban threatens ordinary Brazilians with hefty fines if they evade the prohibition on the social media network. Nevertheless, demand for blockade-piercing VPNs surged in Brazil after the court decision.

Ellison serves alongside Minnesota's Gov. Tim Walz, who is the Democratic candidate for vice president and has falsely claimed "there's no guarantee to free speech on misinformation or hate speech." He's also not the only prominent politician to have a real hate-on for X and its CEO, Elon Musk.

"Regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest if he doesn't stop disseminating lies and hate on X," Robert Reich, Labor Secretary in the Clinton administration and one-time adviser to President Barack Obama, huffed in The Guardian. He cited the recent arrest in France of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov as a precedent. "Like Musk, Durov has styled himself as a free speech absolutist," Reich sniffed.

But the animus doesn't stop with X, Telegram, and their bosses.

"For too long, tech platforms have amplified disinformation and extremism with no accountability," former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton claimed in 2022. "The EU is poised to do something about it. I urge our transatlantic allies to push the Digital Services Act across the finish line and bolster global democracy before it's too late."

Leveraging Foreign Authoritarianism for Domestic Purposes

Why would a former U.S. presidential candidate cheerlead for European speech regulations?

"The Digital Services Act will essentially oblige Big Tech to act as a privatized censor on behalf of governments," Jacob Mchangama, founder of the Danish think tank Justitia and executive director of The Future of Free Speech, warned in 2022. "The European policies do not apply in the U.S., but given the size of the European market and the risk of legal liability, it will be tempting and financially wise for U.S.-based tech companies to skew their global content moderation policies even more toward a European approach to protect their bottom lines and streamline their global standards."

Now in effect, the law is used to squeeze online speech, including as an end-run around U.S. protections for expression. It's not the only overseas bypass of U.S. law, either.

Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina "Khan can't get Congress to pass her antitrust agenda and is losing in U.S. courts, so now she's leaning on foreign governments to do the anti-business work for her," The Wall Street Journal editorial board noted last year about Khan's reliance on European regulators.

Behind-the-Scenes Pressure for Censorship

But attempts to impose control and stifle dissent in the absence of legal authorization or in defiance of constitutional protections also occur here at home. Days after Telegram CEO Durov's arrest in Paris, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg confirmed what had already been revealed by the Twitter and Facebook files—that the government leaned on private companies to suppress dissent and criticism of officialdom.

"Senior officials from the Biden administration, including the White House, repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humor and satire," Zuckerberg told the House Judiciary Committee. He also admitted to suppressing reports about Hunter Biden's laptop and its incriminating contents under pressure from the FBI.

That implicates not only incumbent President Joe Biden, but also Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate for president. Harris has complained in the past that social media companies are "speaking to millions and millions of people without any level of oversight or regulation."

Oversight, it seems, is now applied through back-channel pressure, and regulation by governments in countries that lack serious protections for free speech. The result is to endanger the role of the United States as a haven for free speech and other liberties in a world growing ever-more authoritarian.

The Political Class Embraces an Increasingly Authoritarian World

"Global freedom declined for the 18th consecutive year in 2023. The breadth and depth of the deterioration were extensive," Freedom House cautioned in its 2024 annual report. "Political rights and civil liberties were diminished in 52 countries, while only 21 countries made improvements."

"Today, we are witnessing the dawn of a free-speech recession," Justitia's Mchangama mourned two years ago. "Liberal democracies, rather than constituting a counterweight to the authoritarian onslaught, are themselves contributing to the free-speech recession."

This erosion of protections for free speech and other rights occurs with the encouragement of American officials who want more control over our lives but have been (partly) stymied by American protections for liberty. In a world of global platforms and international travel, these officials are applying extra-legal pressure and relying on overseas friends to punish people for activities that are legal in the U.S.

Readers will notice that most if not all these officials are Democrats. Much ink has been spilled in recent years—rightly—about the authoritarian drift of the Republican Party. GOP vice presidential hopeful J.D. Vance wants to punish ideological opponents and advocates that his allies "seize the administrative state for our own purposes" and that they "seize the assets of the Ford Foundation, tax their assets, and give it to the people who've had their lives destroyed by the radical open borders agenda."

But as illiberalism rises across the political spectrum, Democrats are leapfrogging authoritarianism to embrace a soft totalitarianism enforced by unofficial pressure and foreign allies subject to minimal restraints on their power. They ignore legal constraints and display contempt for this country's protections for liberty in their quest to leave no refuge for dissent.

If liberty has a future in this country, it will be despite the best efforts of the political class.

Comments

[Mickey Rat]

Over a decade ago, the Senate Democrats proposed a constitional amendment to gut the 1st Amendment because they were up in arms over the Citizens United ruling. That the Democrats have gone totalitarian anti free speech is not surprising if you had been paying attention.

[JesseAz (5-30 Banana Republic Day)]

Hey now, as long as they hide their power behind a corporation, Reason is largely okay with it. Muh private companies means never having to criticize the government.

[mad.casual]

Also, MUH EEKWALITEE. Sure, you wind up rounding off the speech rights and thumbing the scales of women and minorities and pretty much everybody but, as long as you cut down on the speech of (the wrong kind of) racists it’s worth it, to be sure.

Maggie Thatcher laid out decades ago how it makes everyone equal by lowering all boats but, as long as we do it via KORPORAYSHUNZ, we can go on saying it’s never really been tried and we didn’t vote for it forever; no matter how many people it impoverishes, tortures, and kills.

[Quicktown Brix]

The Citizens United decision is hard to argue about from a libertarian perspective, but it can be pretty problematic.

The decision that corporations have free speech and that money=speech was a good thing for republicans when decided, but in today’s environment I think that advantage goes to the democrats as big business runs away from MAGA republicans.

Dan Carlin made a good case why corporations buying politicians is problematic: because corporations are international. We end up with Chinese and Russians buying politicians. These companies are not only interested in their US businesses, but in their foreign interests that may come at the expense of the US.

Still, using libertarian principles as a guide would suggest that handing the decision to the government of who can fund whom (full disclosure: I don’t know whym and whenm to use “whom”, but it seemed right there) would be worse than the status quo.

[Mickey Rat]

Citizens United was not specifically about money campaign donations. It was about whether the government could, under campaign finance law, censor press (a documentary) unfriendly to one candidate by treating it as the same as a cash donation to her opponents.

If corporations do not have free speech then the government can censor all major newspapers, television, radio and internet. The assertion corporations do not have rights has such devastating downstream consequences for press freedom that it is much too stupid to contemplate.

[Quicktown Brix]

Thank you for this sobering reality check. I was missing some key information. I feel better that libertarian principles hold up after taking in your explanation.

[BigT]

You relied on Dan Carlin who is a deluded leftist despite his sometimes informative podcasts. He spent one saying Nazis were rightwing!

[Quicktown Brix]

Dan Carlin doesn't fit well in the left-right spectrum. The same can be said for Nazis.

[Wally]

National SOCIALIST fits very well on the left. I recommend reading Winston Churchill's description of how fascism, then National Socialism arose from communism. It's hidden in The Gathering Storm. The book is a great read anyway. It will make you cry if you stop to think about the quality of men who lead the west versus what we had such a short time ago.

[Quicktown Brix]

Disagree. The primary pillars of Nazis were militarism, nationalism and ethnic purity which fits more with the term "right" historically. Their economic beliefs were secondary, but more leftist.

Yes, there's "socialist" in the name, but they were not socialists. They were a centralized economy, but with mainly private ownership. They were a hierarchical society which is not socialist (in theory). They were nationalist, not globalist.

Having said that, I do see that modern democrats are moving more towards Nazi-like policies and bringing the term "left" closer to Nazi rather than the other way around.

[CountmontyC]

" The primary pillars of Nazis were militarism, nationalism and ethnic purity which fits more with the term “right” historically. "
This is only true if you ignore all of the times that the left used militarism, nationalism and ethnic purity as pillars. Such as when a socialist party controlled Germany in the 1930's or when a socialist ruled Italy from 1922-23.

[Quicktown Brix]

I'm not familiar with the details of those, but I'll take your word for it. The whole left-right thing is too simplistic to not have exceptions.

[Squirrelloid]

err... what do you think the term "right" meant historically?

The origin of the left-right language is revolutionary France, where the leftists were socialists and the right was *Royalists* (because the socialists sat on the left in the National Assembly, and the Royalists on the right). Royalists are almost the antithesis of nationalists, and ethnic purity had *nothing to do with it*.

(The liberty-oriented were in the middle -- there were no moderates, per se).

As to national vs. international - there were national socialism movements before the NAZIs; not all socialism is international socialism. (Indeed, *only* communism is international socialism). Most 'successful' (non-communist) socialists have been national socialists, even if they didn't apply that label to themselves, because they were interested in socialism for their nation primarily. (There's probably been more *local* socialists than any other kind, but local socialism is rarely successful over any real length of time).

And while the NAZIs allowed private nominal ownership of the means of production, that only persisted so long as the corporations did what the NAZIs wanted. Real ownership (that is, the ability to direct the use of the means of production) was governmental, it was just exercised through command than through possession.

[Quicktown Brix]

So we're going back to France then? Left and right don't mean that in contemporary discussions. But you help make my point. We use a 2 dimensional model to try to describe an infinitely complicated political system.

[Zeb]

Yeah, I find this argument really tedious. Nazis were left in some ways and right in others. Who gives a shit? Do people think that if they win this argument everyone on the opposing political team will have to quit because they are on the same side of the left/right spectrum as Nazis? They were Nazis and made quite clear what their beliefs and political philosophy were. Trying to label it left or right adds nothing.

[Quicktown Brix]

We may as well be arguing if dogs are left wing and cats are right wing or vise versa.

[Dillinger]

>>whether the government could, under campaign finance law, censor press (a documentary) unfriendly to one candidate by treating it as the same as a cash donation to her opponents.

>>much too stupid to contemplate.

exactly.

[Mickey Rat]

Just to make clear, the losing side of Citizens United was saying "speech=money", therefore speech was subject to censorship.

[Homer Thompson]

The irony is that Reich has been so consistently wrong on every subject matter (Economics, Finance, Covid) that if they were to hand out a prize for the largest purveyor of misinformation he would win in a landslide.

[shadydave]

You could say that the things he's been right about is a very short list.

[SQRLSY]

THIS is why TRUE lovers of liberty support Section 230!

Meanwhile, right-wing wrong-nuts lust after the demise of S-230, thinking that this will allow them to pussy-grab the "libs"... And that the libs will NEVER think of pussy-grabbing them right back!

[Mickey Rat]

Perhaps that is why the Democrats are seeking help with their censorship efforts overseas, where section 230 holds no sway.

[SQRLSY]

Sadly, this is entirely too true!

[Longtobefree]

Fascists are going to do fascism.

[Longtobefree]

I suspect that none of the people who lost their jobs for refusing to be a lab rat thinks the totalitarianism was all that soft.
Or any of those who lost family in deliberately contaminated nursing homes.

[SRG2]

The Democrats are simply wrong here. If misinformation is being promoted, counter it with information. Only where a close enough analogy is found between traditional speech restrictions, e.g., like "fighting words" or "incitement" where there is the likelihood of an immediate response, or where that most verbal of crimes, conspiracy, is taking place, should restrictions be imposed.

Thus Mill:
If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. Were an opinion a personal possession of no value except to the owner; if to be obstructed in the enjoyment of it were simply a private injury, it would make some difference whether the injury was inflicted only on a few persons or on many. But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

the opinion which it is attempted to suppress by authority may possibly be true. Those who desire to suppress it, of course deny its truth; but they are not infallible. They have no authority to decide the question for all mankind, and exclude every other person from the means of judging. To refuse a hearing to an opinion, because they are sure that it is false, is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty. All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility. Its condemnation may be allowed to rest on this common argument, not the worse for being common.

[JasonT20]

The Democrats are simply wrong here. If misinformation is being promoted, counter it with information.

That's the correct ideal, but does it work in the social media world we live in? The simple truth of human nature is that fact checking is never as compelling as a good lie dressed up in emotion. The old proverb says, "A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on." Even that proverb, which dates to at least as far back as 1820, is an idea expressed in Roman times. It was stated more clearly by Jonathan Swift in 1710, though in a less snappy manner:

Few lies carry the inventor’s mark, and the most prostitute enemy to truth, may spread a thousand without being known for the author: besides, as the vilest writer has his readers, so the greatest liar has his believers: and it often happens, that if a lie be believed only for an hour, it has done its work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it; so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the jest is over, and the tale has had its effect: like a man, who has thought of a good repartee, when the discourse is changed, or the company parted; or like a physician, who has found out an infallible medicine, after the patient is dead.

Censoring "misinformation" is not an acceptable solution, at least, not when government has any role in doing so. To the extent that private actors might wish to censor such things, they can only ever do so with their own property, as it then becomes self-censorship. The concern I have is to wonder whether human beings are up to the task of increasing their skepticism to the point where we can combat our own biases and willingness to believe things with little to no evidence that supports them (or that are contradicted by evidence).

[SRG2]

That’s the correct ideal, but does it work in the social media world we live in?

I doubt that it works well for the majority but I am not aware of any alternative that is better. It has always been the human condition that emotional lies are more effective than rational truths. FWIW I was watching the entertaining documentary series “Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War” and it seems that the press were no less concerned about getting the equivalent of clicks 140 years ago than they are now.

We see for example the swiftness with which the allegations of a stolen 2020 election spread, and the resilience with which some people retain the belief that the election was stolen in the face of evidence to the contrary – partly because the way human cognition works, most people don’t distinguish between contingent and absolute facts.

A contingent fact is something like “this is true because that’s what the current evidence says” and an absolute fact is, “this is the evidence”. Good examples occur almost every time a convict is later acquitted of murder after an exculpatory DNA test and families of the victim and sometimes the old prosecutor will say, “I don’t care what the DNA test says, I know he’s the murderer” – because the fact of guilt was contingent only, yet it’s become an absolute fact in their minds.

Perhaps there’s a kind of central limit theorem here – eventually all the errors get washed away and we’re left with the actual facts but it takes longer than we wish. Perhaps in 30 or 40 years’ time, the myth of the stolen election will be held only by a few nutters, akin to the current followers of say Hancock or Sitchin or von Daniken. But the number of believers will never get to zero – just as there are still flat-earthers.

[JasonT20]

Perhaps there’s a kind of central limit theorem here – eventually all the errors get washed away and we’re left with the actual facts but it takes longer than we wish. Perhaps in 30 or 40 years’ time, the myth of the stolen election will be held only by a few nutters, akin to the current followers of say Hancock or Sitchin or von Daniken. But the number of believers will never get to zero – just as there are still flat-earthers.

Myths and conspiracy theories only get washed away, leaving only verifiable facts behind, when the incentives to believe those myths fade with time. Sometimes, though, the incentives to believe in myths about history increase. Ask people that listen to Tucker Carlson about Watergate, and they'll tell you that Nixon was set up by the CIA (because he was working against the "deep state" even then), or ask them about how we ended up with Marxists everywhere, and they will tell you that Joe McCarthy was right. Everything he found out was true!

As I said, I generally agree that any kind of censorship of 'misinformation' is a bad idea and wrong on principle. But we need to do something better than what we are doing now or else the lies will win.

[SRG2]

Citizens United is a separate issue - despite rulings to the contrary, there is no constitutional basis for holding that fictional persons have the same rights as natural persons. It's pure judge-made law.

But CU didn't have its speech banned.

And Breyer:
In the context of election to public office, the distinction between corporate and human speakers is significant. Although they make enormous contributions to our society, corporations are not actually members of it. They cannot vote or run for office. Because they may be managed and controlled by nonresidents, their interests may conflict in fundamental respects with the interests of eligible voters. The financial resources, legal structure, and instrumental orientation of corporations raise legitimate concerns about their role in the electoral process. Our lawmakers have a compelling constitutional basis, if not also a democratic duty, to take measures designed to guard against the potentially deleterious effects of corporate spending in local and national races.

i.e., they're not citizens.

[JasonT20]

But remember, "this Court now concludes that independent expenditures, including those made by corporations, do not give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption. That speakers may have influence over or access to elected officials does not mean that those officials are corrupt. And the appearance of influence or access will not cause the electorate to lose faith in this democracy."

See? Corporations and the billionaires that own and run them spending money to get candidates elected that will lower their taxes has no appearance of corruption. That they get their taxes lowered, regulations that protect the average person cut so that those companies can increase their profits, and all of that profit boost is many times greater than what they spend on politics doesn't mean anything. Voters won't lose faith in democracy because of it.

[Zeb]

The first amendment says nothing about citizens or even human beings. The government (congress) can't restrict certain things os what it says. There is nothing to say it applies only to people.
The concerns Breyer mentions may be legitimate, but the 1st still says what it says. Freedom of the press also pretty strongly implies that the 1st does apply to corporations, as newspapers are for the most part published by corporations and I don't think anyone doubts that it applies to newspapers.

[Squirrelloid]

You don't have to be a citizen to have 1st amendment rights, so Breyer's whole argument is a non-sequitur.

Non-Americans have a right to opine about American politics, too.

[JasonT20]

You don’t have to be a citizen to have 1st amendment rights, so Breyer’s whole argument is a non-sequitur.

Correct. You just need to be a person. A corporation is not a person. It is an association of people with their financial relationships, privileges, and responsibilities toward each other defined by law. It is not as self evident as advocates of corporate political spending would make that a corporation should have the same free speech rights as an individual person, or even other types of associations of people.

[JasonT20]

He's also not the only prominent politician to have a real hate-on for X and its CEO, Elon Musk.

Musk has turned into a not-so-bright internet troll on his own platform. He posted an AI-generated image of Harris in a communist get up. Naturally, and very quickly, AI-generated images of Musk with a Nazi armband appeared as well. It will be interesting to see how long his free speech absolutism lasts when users turn his own trolling against him.

Although, my favorite response to Musk online has to be this one.

[JasonT20]

Of course, he also retweeted this last Sunday a post calling for an elite of "high T alpha males and aneurotypical" people to be the only ones voting in a "republic" that would be "Democratic, but a democracy only for those free to think." He said it was an "interesting observation."

I just wonder why Trump/Elon fans don't consider whether these guys actually care about them or their opinions and instead just want to use them to get what they want for themselves.

[Longtobefree]

I don't support Trump because of what I think he cares about, but because of the actions and results of his administration in contrast to the the actions and results of the Biden-Harris administration.

[JasonT20]

What were the results of Trump's administration that were so great for you? Were you one of those that benefited greatly from the Trump tax cuts? Do you work in an industry that benefited from reduced regulation or the tariff protectionism? Was there some particular part of his foreign policy that benefited you? Or maybe you and people you care about benefited from the COVID vaccines developed by 'Warp Speed'?

Better yet, maybe you live in a GOP controlled, but mostly purple state, and you see the election 'integrity' measures that your state Republican leaders put in place will make it more likely that Republicans will keep control of state government?

Then Pennsylvania House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (R) was speaking at the state GOP committee meeting in 2012:

Pro-Second Amendment? The Castle Doctrine, it’s done. First pro-life legislation – abortion facility regulations – in 22 years, done. Voter ID, which is gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania, done.

[Wally]

Less illegal immigration
No new wars in which the US was involved.
Of the last 4 presidents, a nuclear power invaded a neighbor. Can you guess which one that did not happen under? DJT
Progress towards a more peaceful middle east. (Abraham accords)
Less terrorism funded by Iran because they had less money.
Proper use of military power- Iran launches attack. Response was to kill the planner, not launch a 2 decade war and spend $3T.
I could go on...

[Don't look at me!]

I like when people think they are smarter than Musk.

[JasonT20]

"If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?"

My grandmother would say that to my grandfather when he was lecturing about something. He'd come back with, "I am rich in family."

Both were mostly joking with each other, but there is a serious point in there. People that get extremely wealthy are highly motivated by money. It is their main measure of success for themselves. That is not true for everyone, obviously. For some people (most people, I would argue), they are motivated to have "enough" money, and devote the rest of their energy toward satisfying other desires. Or, it could be that for most people, having more wealth and a higher income is motivating, but the effect decreases as they obtain that greater wealth and income, as the additional effort to obtain more (and any moral compromises they might have to make to obtain more) would not seem worth those results.

And as for the success of the extremely wealthy, success isn't always determined by intelligence or talent. Luck plays a role, being born into the right family can play a role, and having a talent for making money in one way doesn't have to translate to intelligence or talent in other areas.

Ultimately, though, it just seems odd to equate a person's worth with their wealth. After all, the ultimate expression of a person's wealth being equal to their value comes in the form of aristocracy. The bloodline of a particular feudal aristocrat typically began with someone that essentially bought their title or won it through warfare (which required them to be able to pay to build and support an army). Does that seem like a way to judge a person's worth in a modern, free society that values each person's equal natural rights? I don't think so.

[Dillinger]

guessing E has the temerity to laugh at a pic of himself in armband.

[Dillinger]

>>"Regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest if he doesn't stop disseminating lies and hate on X,"

dude this is seventeen miles from "soft" totalitarianism.

[BigT]

"Obrigado Brasil!" Keith Ellison, Minnesota's attorney general, wrote this week to thank that country's authoritarian Supreme Court for its recent ban on the X social media platform.
He should be impeached and disbarred.

[Dillinger]

if I had a vote ...

[TJJ2000]

Think you mean "soft" totalitarianism started a good 17-years ago.
It was 12-Years ago Dinesh was jailed.

[Dillinger]

truth.

[TJJ2000]

“Readers will notice that most if not all these officials are Democrats.”
Indeed. Finally a decent article from Reason.

No. The GOP isn’t perfect. Not even close especially with 1/2 being complete RINO’S. But people with any speckle of a brain should be able to point out [Na]tional So[zi]alist[s] as enemies of the USA. With over a dozen Democrats pridefully wearing that title and 75% pitching the ideology the few decent democrats being maybe 10% just fall-in-line with their [Na]tional So[zi]alist overlords like RINO’S do.

What this nation needs is SCOTUS judges who actually UPHOLD the people's law over their government. Judges more scalia than scalia himself. It's pretty obvious which party there is hope in and which party is just flat-out treasonous and criminal.

[SRG2]

Judges more scalia than scalia himself.

So you trust the government then? Scalia was decidedly pro-prosecutors and police, and was partly responsible for the judicial murder of Herrera of Herrera v. Collins. He did not think it was unconstitutional to execute an innocent man. Do you?

He was an authoritarian theocratic scumbag, and given your professed - to the point of mania - love of liberty, it is truly bizarre that you seem hold him in such high esteem. Or perhaps you're a fan of some mythical Scalia who bears little relation to the real one.

[Wally]

How can see the other comments with your head so far up your ass?

[TJJ2000]

"Later that year, Herrera pleaded guilty to the murder of Rucker. "

"Herrera's former cellmate claimed that Raul Herrera told them that he had killed Rucker and Carrisalez. Leonel Herrera claimed that the new evidence showed that he was actually innocent"

He pleaded guilty and then later tried to use his dead brothers cellmates 'say so' as evidence of being innocent.

First; I don't think cellmate 'say so' is proven innocence.
Second; The Union of States should be on the hesitant side of disturbing State prosecution.

[BigT]

Matt Walsh or Matt Welch?

You choose.

[But SkyNet is a Private Company]

The ruling party wants to jail its opponent on trumped up bullshit charges (or just murder him) and remove others from the ballot. Soft indeed.