Jailed a month for anti-Trump meme, ex-cop's charges dismissed after sheriff admits no threat

Conservative parodies and memes of elected officials were so threatening to Democrat-run California, Hawaii and Minnesota that each banned them as "deceptive" media. 

California's law quickly went down, with one federal judge blocking it and state Attorney General Rob Bonta promising another not to enforce it, while Minnesota got in trouble for submitting an AI-written expert declaration that included false citations. Courts are considering judgment motions in Minnesota and Hawaii challenges as of this month.

Now a red state is facing scrutiny for jailing a self-described "a–hole" for a month on $2 million bail, claiming a frequently circulated meme he shared in a local Facebook group ahead of a Sept. 23 Charlie Kirk vigil – adding his own comment "This seems relevant today" – would be reasonably interpreted as his own threat to shoot up a local high school.

Tennessee's Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems told NewsChannel 5 on Wednesday afternoon that charges had just been dismissed, a day after Weems told the station that investigators knew 61-year-old Larry Bushart's meme quoting President Trump a day after a 2024 school shooting in Perry, Iowa – "We have to get over it" – did not refer to Perry County High School.

Bushart's wife credited that interview with prompting prosecutors to drop the case, investigative reporter Phil Williams told the newscast. But the former Huntingdon Police Department officer had been in jail so long he "lost his job doing medical transport," sources told the station.

Police bodycam footage from Bushart's Lexington home also undermines Weems' claim that officers told the liberal keyboard warrior the meme "was being interpreted as a threat to shoot up Perry County High School" and he was arrested for refusing to take it down.

While Bushart indeed refused to take down the post, the responding officer told Bushart "I have really no idea" what a Perry County investigator meant by Bushart's "concerning posts … insinuating violence," and professed ignorance when Bushart said the investigator was inquiring about his Kirk post.

Bushart learned for the first time he was charged with “threatening mass violence at a school" when Lexington police read him the arrest warrant while walking him handcuffed into the station, hours after the first police visit to his home, more bodycam video shows.

The prosecution is based on a Tennessee law passed after the Covenant School shooting that approved new sanctions for "recklessly making a threat of mass violence" and has been widely used since, according to an Oct. 23 investigation by The Intercept. 

The ACLU state affiliate had warned the law was so broad "it could potentially criminalize a wide range of adults and children who do not have any intent of actually causing harm or making a threat." One target of the law: middle-school cheerleaders making a TikTok video.

'I do not see how this charge can be sustained'

Free-speech advocates not associated with the political left criticized officials for Bushart's arrest, prosecution and bail amount, which under a four-month-old state law would cost him at least $210,000 to get out of jail before his trial, according to Reason. 

His originally scheduled Oct. 29 hearing at which Bushart could request a lowered bond amount, more than a month after he was jailed, had been pushed back to Dec. 4.

Bushart's comments "appear to be protected political speech under governing Supreme Court precedent" and his delayed hearing is "troubling," George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley wrote Wednesday before Bushart's release.

"The Tennessee case appears to fall substantially short" of SCOTUS precedents as recent as 2023, when it reversed a stalking conviction of a Colorado man who sent a female musician thousands of messages on Facebook, some mentioning her car and movements, Turley wrote. "I do not see how this charge can be sustained on these facts."

The law professor noted SCOTUS required showing a defendant's subjective state of mind as intending a threat when it reversed another conviction based on violent rap lyrics in 2015, faulting jury instructions that imposed a "reasonable person" standard.

No school records about perceived threat, sheriff's office clams up

"However much offense it caused, there's no serious argument it was a threat," Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Director of Public Advocacy Aaron Terr wrote Oct. 8. "It's hard to see the arrest and charges as anything but politically motivated."

When FIRE filed public records requests for school communications related to the case that included keywords such as "shooting" and "meme," the district said it had none and pointed FIRE to Weems' office, The Intercept investigation said.

The left-leaning publication detailed Bushart's increasingly strident and voluminous Facebook posts and the "emotional response" to Kirk's assassination by Sheriff Weems, another "avid" Facebook user, who had warned the same school a month earlier about another threat, prompting administrators to close it.

"The school district doesn’t have a single record about" the supposed "mass hysteria" Bushart's post caused among parents and teachers, FIRE lawyer Adam Steinbaugh wrote, referring to Weems' response – since deleted, according to The Intercept – to confusion on Facebook about the basis for the arrest when Weems publicized the earliest news coverage. 

The sheriff's office Facebook page went down after the "Justice for Larry Bushart" Facebook page creator "started commenting on different Facebook pages linked to the sheriff," including his reelection page, which also disappeared, according to The Intercept. Weems told the publication the department page "has been in the process" of being deleted since July.

The sheriff's office did not respond to FIRE records requests, and a deputy told The Intercept "I’m not releasing anything due to the scrutiny and the harassing phone calls we’ve had," saying such records would have to be subpoenaed. Steinbaugh called that illegal.

Lexington's police chief also denied Weems' claim to News 2 that the former's department coordinated with Weem's office to "de-escalate the situation before an arrest was made." 

Weems told the station "Bushart declined to clarify his public messages and calm the situation" and earlier told The Tennessean he was arrested on the basis that "numerous" teachers, parents and students reached out to Weems' office with concerns.

The sheriff did not respond to Just the News queries to his personal email, listed on a University of Tennessee page, or through Perry County. His department has no contact information listed on the county website.

Bushart's freedom comes as a former Illinois State University teaching assistant, fired for allegedly flipping over a Turning Point USA table earlier this month, found himself arrested by the FBI and Secret Service and charged with allegedly threatening Trump.

Also this week, suburban D.C.'s Fairfax County Public Schools implied discipline was on the table for Muslim Students Association chapters at two high schools for recruitment videos it called "especially traumatizing to our Jewish students, staff, and community."

The social media videos "depict violence, including kidnappings, with victims being hooded and placed in the trunk of a car" and feature "high school student organization members that are neither school nor division approved," FCPS said in a statement given to WJLA.

"Any students found to be violating our Student Rights and Responsibilities will be held accountable for their actions," the district said.