Trump calls for jail sentence for desecrating flag: ‘Stupid people’ will say it’s unconstitutional

Former President Trump said there should be a one-year jail sentence for anyone who desecrates the American flag in the wake of anti-Israel protests over the war in Gaza outside Union Station in Washington, D.C., that included a group burning an American flag.

Trump, who has previously called for criminalizing burning the flag, scoffed at those who point out it’s not illegal to do so.

“You should get a one-year jail sentence if you do anything to desecrate the American flag,” Trump said Wednesday on “Fox & Friends” when asked about the protests. 

“Now, people will say, ‘Oh, it’s unconstitutional.’ Those are stupid people. Those are stupid people that say that,” the former president continued. “We have to work in Congress to get a one-year jail sentence. When they’re allowed to stomp on the flag and put lighter fluid on the flag and set it afire, when you’re allowed to do that — you get a one-year jail sentence, and you’ll never see it again.”

In the 1989 case Texas v. Johnson, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that the act of burning an American flag is constitutionally protected free speech under the First Amendment.

Republicans and Democrats have both condemned the demonstrations outside Union Station on Wednesday while Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke down the road in the U.S. Capitol to members of Congress about his country’s ongoing war with Hamas.

Protesters took down an American flag and replaced it with a Palestinian flag and at one point burned the U.S. flag before someone ran into the crowd and snatched it away.

D.C. Metropolitan Police said six protesters were arrested at the scene. At least five protesters were also arrested in the House gallery during Netanyahu’s speech, and another five were arrested while marching on Constitution Avenue.

Inside the Capitol, Netanyahu used part of his nearly hourlong speech to denounce the protesters outside and on college campuses earlier this year, accusing his critics of standing “with evil” and saying they should be “ashamed of themselves.”  

Palestinian health authorities have said more than 38,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza during Israel’s military campaign there in response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks, which killed more than 1,100 people.