Two days after an ICE agent shot and killed RenĆ©e Good in Minneapolis, Rep. Roger Williams issued an ultimatum to the Trump administration’s critics in Minnesota and beyond.

ā€œPeople need to quit demonstrating, quit yelling at law enforcement, challenging law enforcement, and begin to get civil,ā€ the Texas Republican told NewsNation. ā€œAnd until we do that, I guess we’re going to have it this way. And the people that are staying in their homes or doing the right thing need to be protected.ā€

That’s a pretty clear encapsulation of MAGA-world’s views on dissent these days. You aren’t supposed to protest. You aren’t supposed to ā€œyell atā€ or ā€œchallengeā€ the militarized federal agents occupying your city. And anyone who wants to be ā€œprotectedā€ should probably just stay ā€œin their homes.ā€ Williams isn’t some fringe backbencher; he’s a seven-term congressman who chairs the House Small Business Committee. He is announcing de facto government policy.

For nearly a year, President Donald Trump and his allies have been engaged in an escalating assault on the First Amendment. The administration has systematically targeted or threatened many of Trump’s most prominent critics: massive law firms, Jimmy Kimmel, even, at one point, Elon Musk. But it’s worth keeping in mind that some of the earliest victims of the president’s second-term war on speech were far less powerful.