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Podcast: Cato Event Podcast
Episode: A Right to Lie? Presidents, Other Liars, and the First Amendment
Description: Do the nation’s highest officers, including the president, have a right to lie, no matter what damage their falsehoods cause? Does freedom of expression protect falsehoods? If so, are lies by candidates and public officials protected? And is there a constitutional path, without violating the First Amendment, to stop a president whose persistent lies endanger our lives and our democracy?Perhaps counterintuitively, the general answer to each question is “yes.” Drawing from dramatic court cases about defamers, proponents of birtherism, braggarts, and office holders, Ross reveals the almost insurmountable constitutional and practical obstac...