week we've become aware of what has become a pattern of grotesque violence against the jewish community in pittsburgh an african american church community that we have to save rally in charlottesville where somebody in engaged in violence and killed somebody with his car that's not what this case is about the first amendment does not protect that activity the first amendment does not prohibit the government from introducing statements of bias of racist views of anti semite views to establish that those people should be did in this case was it explicitly a punishment to those things and i mean it kept recognizing look i know i'm not supposed to punish people for ideas but i can't get over this idea that of someone who at this point of life ought to know better and they represent a threat and if you hold still as ideas and people as i said ideas matter people do things based on their ideas and if these are his ideas he is a very dangerous person defendant every defendant who is sentenced as an individual who should be judged on the accomplishments visited on the laws that he has i think the court and consider that but to impose additional punishment face on of you that these ideas are dangerous fast runs afoul of the first amendment because there is a fundamental first amendment principle the government should not punish people based on ideas is because he negotiated with the united states that the united states felt it was appropriate to recommend a sentence of no longer than thirty six months of in prison the united states its recommendation carries a lot of weight he certainly made a recommendation for probation given the facts of this case i don't practice in that district court it may be that a sentence of probation was possible in some other districts that may be were going by the of the government the defendant the probation officers recommendation and that's because it just couldn't get over this belief that these ideas are dangerous well that's contrary to what he said  miss these ideas he ought to know better these ideas represent a threat if he holds these ideas he's dangerous and that's that's just contrary to what the first amendment protests what the supreme court said in an appropriate inquiry for the jury to consider is this person going to be dangerous to others whether in prison or not and the supreme court said no you cannot take into account abstractly to  i guess that's my question i don't think it is again i think as i said earlier i think that the district court can consider everything that happened in this interview i think that and you can take that into consideration of who is this person in front of me how to see behavior does the you know respect authority that type of thing but the basis for the district court sense was you know you should've listened to your lawyer and you know what happened it was these ideas are dangerously here and it's very clear the supreme court said and in the mitchell case an abstract at least however of noxious to most people may not be taken into consideration by a sentencing judge his neck and in the context of describing his hatred for racial minorities and for the united states for granting civil rights to racial minorities that is what you described some pride is nazi ancestral heritage so i don't think it was defendant's statements into sentencing when those statements are relevant to one of the crime or second relevant to legitimate sentencing considerations dangerousness is one such consideration case the defendant had seventeen prior convictions over fifteen years think looted several felonies and that included violence such as beating and strangling his micro friend threatening the lives of his family and threatening to kill  was in contact with his with his girlfriend and the court below sat i'm not playing and i'm not putting too much weight on your views the court was plainly more interested in his criminal history but the court said in the context of your criminal history your statement and the fact that you were in possession of a gun and have no respect for the rule of law makes you in the district court you very dangerous and so the court nonetheless like today below guidelines sentence here but  relevant and have a stated that has have as stated basis for the relevance of mr smith's views the fact that a jury was a black box and dawson i believe was relevant it was also true that in dawson a part of the disagreement between the i'd like to pick up where i'm going from left off capital sentencings certainly are about dangerousness it's a decision about whether this person poses a risk of danger to other inmates for the rest of his life or whether we need to take for hate crimes or crimes relating to bias those sorts motivated crimes and i think the court can start and stop with how the supreme court summed it up in mitchell abstract beliefs however obnoxious may not be taken into consideration by some some judge the judge here took those beliefs into consideration to increase the penalty and so unlike the pay via for example kapadia was a hate crime that's why dawson didn't apply it clearly was relevant that a person with an anti semitic bias but yes the defendant did have while physically violent offenses previews right but they weren't motivated by any sort struggle with can i say i know i can't stand based on these ideas but at the end of the sentencing hearing his comments indicate that in fact he is in specifically incorporating these ideas into a sen decision to impose a sentence higher than that recommended by any of the parties so for that reason we feel that he did violate the first amendment rule against punishing ideas we've asked for you sounds thank you thank