The legacy media is inevitably skeptical of anything favored by the Trump administration, and that apparently includes free speech.
Margaret Brennan, host of CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” was accused of revisionist history for an interview Sunday with Secretary of State Marco Rubio in which she said that Nazi Germany took advantage of free speech to carry out the Holocaust.
Her comments came in response to an address Friday by Vice President J.D. Vance at the Munich Security Conference in which he dinged European nations for backsliding on freedom of expression.
“He was standing in a country where free speech was weaponized to conduct a genocide,” said Ms. Brennan, referring to the 6 million Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps from 1941-45.
Mr. Rubio immediately challenged her claim, saying “I have to disagree with you. Free speech was not used to conduct a genocide.”
“The genocide was conducted by an authoritarian Nazi regime that happened to also be genocidal because they hated Jews and they hated minorities and they hated those that they — they had a list of people they hated, but primarily the Jews,” Mr. Rubio said. “There was no free speech in Nazi Germany. There was none.”
The Holocaust Encyclopedia backs him up, saying that the German constitution guaranteed freedom of speech and freedom of the press when the Nazis assumed power in 1933.
“Through decrees and laws, the Nazis abolished these civil rights and destroyed German democracy,” said the encyclopedia. “Starting in 1934, it was illegal to criticize the Nazi government. Even telling a joke about Hitler was considered treachery. People in Nazi Germany could not say or write whatever they wanted.”
The Nazis did use propaganda to demonize Jews by, for example, publishing antisemitic images and tropes.
Those outraged by Ms. Brennan’s comments included Mr. Vance, who called the interview a “crazy exchange.”
“Does the media really think the holocaust was caused by free speech?” asked Mr. Vance on X.
Sen. Tom Cotton, Arkansas Republican, said her comments reflect arguments made by the left to justify squelching disfavored speech.
“The notion that free speech caused the Holocaust is deeply offensive, it’s preposterous, and it’s a window into how far the left is willing to go to implement censorship,” Mr. Cotton said Monday on X.
CBS News has made no public comment on the episode, but MSNBC Vice President of Editorial Jesse Rodriguez defended Ms. Brennan.
“The Nazi regime used mass media, including newspapers, radio, films, and public speeches, to spread antisemitic conspiracy theories, dehumanize Jews and incite violence,” he said on X.
Others countered that free speech is needed to combat such disinformation and propaganda.
“Which is exactly why free speech is so essential. Governments, including our own, routinely issue disinformation,” conservative pollster Scott Rasmussen said on X. “Free speech is needed to combat it.”
Ms. Brennan’s comment also prompted a host of satirical responses.
National Review Online editor Philip Klein cracked on X: “If it weren’t for the famously robust 1st Amendment protections in Nazi Germany the Jews might have stood a chance.”
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.