Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign tried to strong-arm the famous Laugh Factory comedy club into removing a video from its website of comedians making fun of the Democratic presidential frontrunner, Judicial Watch reports.
Appropriately titled "Hillary Clinton vs. the First Amendment," the video is posted here for your enjoyment and to affirm the Washington Free Beacon’s commitment to free expression in the face of attempts at censorship by humorless political elites.
Judicial Watch reported on the threats from the Clinton campaign on Wednesday.
A video of the short performance, which is less than three minutes, is posted on the website of the renowned club, Laugh Factory, and the Clinton campaign has tried to censor it. Besides demanding that the video be taken down, the Clinton campaign has demanded the personal contact information of the performers that appear in the recording. This is no laughing matter for club owner Jamie Masada, a comedy guru who opened Laugh Factory more than three decades ago and has been instrumental in launching the careers of many famous comics. "They threatened me," Masada told Judicial Watch. "I have received complains before but never a call like this, threatening to put me out of business if I don’t cut the video." […]
Masada told Judicial Watch that, as soon as the video got posted on the Laugh Factory website, he received a phone call from a "prominent" person inside Clinton’s campaign. "He said the video was disgusting and asked who put me up to this," Masada said. The Clinton staffer, who Masada did not want to identify, also demanded to know the names and phone numbers of the comedians that appear in the video. Masada refused and hung up. He insists that the comedy stage is a sanctuary for freedom of speech no matter who is offended. "Just last night we had (Emmy-award winner) Dana Carvey doing Donald Trump and it was hilarious," Masada said.