Can people be fired for celebrating Kirk assassination? Yes, attorneys say

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(The Center Square) – Can employers fire employees for celebrating a political assassination? The short answer is yes, attorneys say, especially by private companies in right to work states.

As hundreds of Americans are reporting they’ve been fired for posting comments on their “private social media pages” celebrating Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk’s assassination, many are arguing they have the right to do so under the First Amendment.

According to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, hate speech and inciting violence is not protected speech. In recent remarks to media outlets, she said, "There's free speech and then there's hate speech. There is no place, especially now, especially after what happened to Charlie, in our society.” She also said of the Department of Justice, “We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech. And that’s across the aisle."

In an interview with Fox News, Bondi said employers “have an obligation to get rid of people, you need to look at people who are saying harmful things, and they shouldn't be working with you.” She also said the DOJ was looking into an OfficeMax incident after a former employee refused to print a flyer for a Kirk memorial saying it was discrimination, even though OfficeMax immediately terminated the employee.

News commentator Matt Walsh, who’s had recent death threats made against him, called for Bondi to be fired in response. “Get rid of her. Today. This is insane. Conservatives have fought for decades for the right to refuse service to anyone. We won that fight,” he said. “Now Pam Bondi wants to roll it all back for no reason. The employee who didn’t print the flyer was already fired by his employer. This stuff is being handled successfully through free speech and free markets. This is totally gratuitous and pointless. We need the AG focused on bringing down the left-wing terror cells, not prosecuting Office Depot for God’s sake.”

Multiple posts online claim Bondi is “desecrating Charlie’s memory” and Kirk didn’t agree with her position. They reposted a Kirk statement from last May stating, “Hate speech does not exist legally in America. There’s ugly speech. There’s gross speech. There’s evil speech. And ALL of it is protected by the First Amendment. Keep America free.”

However, Jewish attorneys who’ve sued Palestinian organizations alleging they incited violence on college campuses argue hate speech, including students advocating “Death to Jews,” is not protected speech. Islamic groups sued Texas Gov. Greg Abbott stating protesters have a First Amendment right to support Hamas and Abbott directing state law enforcement to arrest rioters was unconstitutional. Abbott maintains that rioters should be arrested, jailed, expelled and, when applicable, deported, The Center Square reported.

Abbott also says public school teachers who celebrate political assassination should be fired. In Texas, more than 100 public school teachers have been, or are in the process of, being suspended. Some have already been fired after they publicly appeared to blame Kirk for his own assassination, The Center Square reported.

The Texas legislature has also formed bipartisan committees to investigate freedom on college campuses, The Center Square reported.

For private employers, and especially those in right to work states, employees have limited free speech protections, attorneys argue.

"A private company can generally fire an employee for public comments, even political ones, if those comments are deemed to harm the company's reputation, violate workplace policy or disrupt the business," workplace attorney Marjorie Mesidor told CBS MoneyWatch.

Multiple companies have announced they’ve fired employees for statements or actions they’ve made appearing to celebrate Kirk’s murder, including Office Max, Nasdaq, MSNBC, the Washington Post, several colleges and universities, United Airlines, among others.

South Carolina attorney Shaun Kent of Kent Law Firm LLC said he’s received numerous calls from people who were fired for their posts about Kirk. “People are forgetting about the First Amendment of the United States Constitution,” he said. “They are saying, ‘Mr. Kent, I have freedom of speech. I should be allowed to say anything I want at work on my private social media account.’”

“It's not private,” he said, “it’s social” and public, by definition, he said. In right to work states like South Carolina, employees can be let go for any reason, including social media posts that don’t represent the employer or risk the employer’s reputation, he said. In response to a teacher saying he was suspended because he said, “Charlie Kirk deserved to die,” Kent said, “he’s teaching our kids?”

He also reiterated the difference between freedom of speech and freedom of consequences. “You have the right to say whatever the hell you want,” this means “our government is not going to arrest you for saying what you want. We're not going to kill you for saying what you want. However, your employer has the right to terminate you.”

“People get confused between freedom of speech and freedom of consequences and there are consequences to our actions,” he said.