Report: Donald Trump Volunteers Are Forbidden From Criticizing Him for the Rest of Their Lives


Volunteers on the mission to “Make America Great Again” are apparently chill with signing away their First Amendment rights.

According to a report from the Daily Dot, which got ahold of a leaked contract from Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, volunteers are forbidden from speaking ill of the real estate magnate or any of his family members—for life. The contract also forbids volunteers from jumping ship and working for another presidential candidate “should they change their minds.”

But as legal experts who talked to the Daily Dot explained, the contract is likely to have little legal legitimacy and would have a difficult time not getting laughed out of court.

“He’s apparently so afraid that people would say something bad about him after spending some time on his campaign that they have to sign some sort of agreement,” lawyer Davida Perry told the site. “I don’t see how this stands up. I don’t see how a court enforces this.”

Perry’s take on the document might be comforting to the volunteers who still care about their own free speech. But it might not matter! As he’s admitted recently, Trump enjoys suing people just to make their lives pure hell.

“I spent a couple of bucks on legal fees, and they spent a whole lot more,” he told the Washington Post. “I did it to make his life miserable, which I’m happy about.”

Read the Daily Dot‘s entire report here.

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DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do things differently in the aftermath of a political crisis: Watergate. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after, and go deep on, stories others don’t. And we’re a nonprofit newsroom because we knew corporations and billionaires would never fund the journalism we do. Our reporting makes a difference in policies and people’s lives changed.

And we need your support like never before to vigorously fight back against the existential threats American democracy and journalism face. We’re running behind our online fundraising targets and urgently need all hands on deck right now. We can’t afford to come up short—we have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

Please help with a donation today if you can—even just a few bucks helps. Not ready to donate but interested in our work? Sign up for our Daily newsletter to stay well-informed—and see what makes our people-powered, not profit-driven, journalism special.

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