ACLU Sues JD Vance Over Progressive Cat-Themed Activist’s “Purr-tected Speech”

The creator of a popular cat-focused Instagram account devoted to trolling JD Vance filed a lawsuit Tuesday alleging that she was denied entry to a public-facing event featuring the vice president over her political views.“The government can’t exclude me from official vice-presidential events just because I mock people in power on the internet,” Amanda McGonigle, who goes by the handle @CatsOnACouch on Instagram, where she has nearly 2 million followers, said in a press release from the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the suit on her behalf.According to the complaint, filed July 7 in the United States District Court for the District of Maine, McGonigle registered to attend a May 26 event in Bangor that was part of Vance’s schedule for the White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud.The lawsuit claims that although the content creator received confirmation of her attendance and traveled to Bangor, Secret Service officers “singled her out by name” while in line and said, “We know where you stand.”The complaint details an alleged exchange between McGonigle and the Secret Service following this initial exchange.McGongile claims she responded, “It is a cat account; this is silly,” to which the Secret Service allegedly replied that the event was “private.”McGongile then says she asked, “To be clear, it’s a private event and even though I received my registration via email, I can’t attend.”The lawsuit claims that the Secret Service then said, “That is correct.” View this post on Instagram A post shared by Cats on a Couch by Amanda McGonigle (@catsonacouch)The complaint seeks to establish that McGongile being denied attendance to public events featuring JD Vance is an unconstitutional form of retaliation against her political speech, and that it constitutes viewpoint discrimination.“The First Amendment protects every person’s right to express their opinions and political views, free from fear of government retaliation or ret