Desi Lydic is disturbed by the Trump administration’s crackdown on free speech in response to the assassination of right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk.
The recurring Daily Show host condemned the idea that people should be punished for posting negatively about Kirk’s death in her Tuesday monologue, showing a clip of Attorney General Pam Bondi declaring, “There’s free speech and then there’s hate speech. … We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.”
Attorney General Pam Bondi: “There’s free speech and then there’s hate speech, and there is no place, especially now, especially after what happened to Charlie, in our society…We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech.” pic.twitter.com/Bqj6TQOGwP
— The Bulwark (@BulwarkOnline) September 16, 2025
Lydic responded, “First of all, you would think that the attorney general would know that hate speech is protected by the First Amendment.”
“Even if you’re not a big reader, it is the first one,” Lydic said. “You have to read it to get to the one you like,” she joked, referencing the Second Amendment that guarantees the right to bear arms.
She continued, “Now honestly, if I went back in time and told the Founding Fathers that this is what would become of the First Amendment, they would say, ‘That’s insane! And why are you wearing pants, woman?’”
“The point is, we need to understand that no matter how mad someone makes you online, that’s not enough to make it illegal,” said Lydic.
Earlier in her monologue, Lydic criticized Vice President JD Vance for using similar rhetoric to Bondi. She shared a clip of Vance telling viewers, “When you see someone celebrating Charlie’s murder, call them out. And hell, call their employer.”
“Is this what we want?” Lydic asked. “The vice president’s job isn’t to lead an online mob. The vice president’s job is to… Okay, he doesn’t really have a job, but you get my point.”
Lydic called out Republican Congressman Clay Higgins’ declaration on Thursday that he’ll push to permanently ban social media users for posting “violent political hate content.” Higgins also argued that these users should have their business and driver’s licenses revoked.
“First of all, revoking someone’s driver’s license is not a punishment for them; it’s a punishment for their friends,” Lydic said.
More seriously, she added, “But do you see how far this has gotten out of control? We’re going to revoke a person’s driver’s license just for having s–tty tweets?”
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