https://pjmedia.com/trending/extortion-liberal-mayor-tries-to-shut-down-trump-rally-with-outrageous-security-fee/
Minneapolis’s liberal mayor, Jacob Frey, has demanded $530,000 in security costs for a Trump campaign rally this Thursday — 26 times the cost of security for a 2009 Obama rally. In violation of its contract, the Target Center threatened to cancel the rally unless the campaign forks over the cash.
“This is an outrageous abuse of power by a liberal mayor trying to deny the rights of his own city’s residents just because he hates the President,” Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement. “People want to hear from their President, and no mayor looking to beef up his resume for a run for higher office should stand in the way.”
College campuses have imposed outrageous security costs as a pretext to shut down controversial speakers, often conservatives. In 2018, the University of Wisconsin tried to charge its College Republicans club $17,000 in security fees for a rally. The College Republicans sued, claiming a violation of their First Amendment free speech rights, and the college settled, paying the club $122,500 in legal fees.
The Trump campaign alleged that Frey “is abusing the power of his office and attempting to extort President Trump’s re-election campaign by conjuring a phony and outlandish bill for security in an effort to block a scheduled Keep America Great rally. Democrat Mayor Frey is using the bogus security charges to pressure the Target Center, site of the contracted October 10, 2019 rally, into preventing Minnesota residents from exercising their First Amendment rights in support of President Trump.”