Andrew Weissmann

And the whole context of it was to coerce.

Zelensky to say that he was doing a fraud investigation of Joe Biden and his son.

And the sort of gun to his head was the withholding of military aid that had been congressionally authorized and approved.

So the president said over and over again publicly that.

that that's not what happened, this is perfect.

But he never testified before Congress.

He didn't even submit a statement, whether under oath or not, to Congress saying what he was saying publicly.

And what I think is the reason is if you lie, whether under oath or not, to Congress, if you submit something false to Congress,

that is prescribed by the criminal laws.

That is, there are consequences to that.

I do think that is a big part of it.

But it is complicated because the state of the law is that there is no First Amendment protection for false speech itself.

In other words, there's many cases from our Supreme Court saying that there is no value or

Or minimal value.

And different justices take different views on that.

But that false speech is not something core to the First Amendment.

The concern is, will there be a chilling effect on true speech?

But I have an analogy for you.

on that, Terry.

So as you mentioned, I work for MSNOW as a legal analyst.