CNN’s Tapper: If We Can’t Criticize Our Leaders ‘We Are No Longer’ the USA

On Thursday’s broadcast of CBS’s The Late Show, CNN’s Jake Tapper sounded the alarm on what he views as a troubling erosion of free speech in America. His comments came during a discussion about recent remarks from FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr, which Tapper framed as an example of government interference in the marketplace of ideas. While the details may sound technical, the implications touch the very core of the First Amendment and the balance between government power and individual liberty.

Tapper explained, “Brendan Carr is signaling he wants local media to stop carrying this speech and this speaker that Trump doesn’t approve of. Got it. Got the message. And we saw what happened. This is it’s a direct violation of the First Amendment because it is the government telling companies what to do with the implicit threat of he said, we can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way. And they chose the easy way.”

The concern Tapper raised is one conservatives have been warning about for years: when unelected bureaucrats use regulatory authority to shape speech, the danger extends far beyond partisan politics. The Founders understood that government power, once unchecked, tends to grow. The First Amendment was crafted not to protect popular or polite speech but to safeguard dissent, criticism, and even ridicule of those in power. To undermine that principle is to chip away at the foundation of self-government.

Host Stephen Colbert asked, “Has it been politicized before this that you know of?” Tapper responded with a rare admission about the seriousness of the issue: “Not to this degree. I have never seen an FCC chairman call for a direct action by local affiliates to do something to remove a speaker and speech that they don’t like. And it’s chilling. And it’s actually the exact opposite of, you know, these were supposedly going to be the free speech champions.”

Colbert then added, “That was part of the campaign. They were tired of being censored and that there were free speech absolutists.”

Tapper went further, quoting former President Donald Trump directly: “Listen to this, ‘I will also sign an executive order to immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech to America. Never again will the immense power of the state be weaponized to persecute political opponents.’ Donald Trump, January of this year.”

This reminder is critical. For all the criticism Trump receives from the media, his position on censorship has been clear: government should not decide which voices are allowed and which are silenced. That position is firmly rooted in the American tradition of limited government and individual liberty, even if critics are reluctant to acknowledge it.

Tapper concluded, “If we do not have the ability to criticize mock, investigate our leaders, then we are no longer the United States of America.” His words reflect an irony that conservatives cannot ignore. The same press outlets that often champion expansive government action now find themselves worried about the abuse of that power when it threatens their own speech. But conservatives have long argued that unchecked bureaucracies and politicized regulators will always pose a danger to liberty.

The larger lesson here is that free speech is not a partisan issue. It is the bedrock of our republic. Without it, debates collapse into propaganda, accountability evaporates, and citizens lose their role as a check on government excess. Whether one agrees with Tapper or not, the warning he issued on Colbert’s stage underscores a truth conservatives have emphasized for decades: if government is allowed to police speech, the United States begins to resemble something very different from the nation our Founders envisioned.