A political activist’s desire to register a suggestive phrase targeting Donald Trump’s anatomy and policies is at the center of a Supreme Court case being heard Wednesday that will test the limits of the First Amendment.
Trump is not a party to the case, but his name will likely be tossed around constantly during oral arguments as the justices weigh whether a federal trademark statute that prevented the activist from registering “Trump Too Small” as a slogan for t-shirts without the former president’s explicit permission runs afoul of the First Amendment.
“The mark criticizes Trump by using a double entendre, invoking a widely publicized exchange from a 2016 Republican primary debate in which Trump commented about his anatomy, while also expressing Elster’s view about ‘the smallness of Donald Trump’s overall approach to governing as president of the United States,’” attorneys for the activist, Steve Elster, told the justices in court papers.
The Supreme Court gets to pick and choose the cases they take. They usually take around a hundred each year. There are usually several thousand submitted to them. This is one that they took.