MAGA Republicans who called Trump a free speech hero have some explaining to do: experts

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to the media before departing West Palm Beach aboard Air Force One, Florida, U.S., March 23, 2026. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

The New York Times is taking the Trump administration back to court after President Donald Trump’s Department of Defense announced it will immediately close the media offices inside the Pentagon and moved them to a so-called annex that will ‘be available when ready.’

MS Now anchor Dana Perino reports this move to be another refusal by the administration to accept defeat after a federal judge ruled in favor of seven New York Times reporters who lost their Pentagon credentials because they wouldn't agree to extreme new rules that even conservative outlets refused.

Media Matters President Angelo Carusone called the administration’s decision “a battle of attrition.”

“They're trying to radically transform not just the news media, but the confines of the First Amendment,” said Carusone. “You have to fight for it if you're going to defend it. There's no way around that. And what this shows us [is] that they are going to counterpunch each time, and you have to be girded to grind through this, otherwise they will inevitably win through attrition.”

Bulwark writer Sam Stein called out MAGA enclaves who boasted that a new Trump presidency would be a boon for freedom of speech.

“Heading into this administration, there was this big conventional wisdom among a lot of the tech bros and people in certain parts of the commentariat that this was an administration that really, truly appreciated the First Amendment, that they were gung-ho about protecting the rights of reporters and journalists and free speech and free thinkers. And it is obviously bs,” said Stein. “It has been proven to be wrong, and I think those people should live in shame for the idea, which was fallacy to begin with, that this would be some sort of beacon of freedom of First Amendment rights.”

Carusone agreed, arguing that the MAGA element that made such claims should be feeling embarrassed.

“A large part of the people that glommed onto MAGA, this was one of their core tenets, not just ‘no new wars’ and getting into foreign entanglements, but this idea that somehow Democrats and the rest of the culture had gotten so stifling for them that you didn't have free speech anymore, and that the only way to get free speech back was to bring Trump into office,” said Carosone.

“And obviously, this has been proven to be entirely true. And I think the real problem there … is that … they don't live in shame,” Carusone added. “They don't feel shame. They should be atoning for that on a regular basis, and being an active part of the solution and the bulwark against this assault on the First Amendment.”

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