A German comedian is set to stand trial later this month after making a controversial joke about the 2024 assassination attempt on former U.S. President Donald Trump.
Sebastian Hotz, known online as El Hotzo, faces charges of “condoning and rewarding criminal acts” and could face up to three years in prison. The controversy stems from a post he made shortly after the July 13 shooting at a Trump campaign rally, in which he compared the failed attempt to catching a missed bus:
“You sadly just missed it,” he wrote.
Hotz later reinforced his position, stating:
“I find it fantastic when fascists die. Absolutely no one forces you to feel sorry for fascists – you can just not do it without the slightest consequence.”
Following public backlash, Hotz was dismissed from his role at RBB, a German public broadcaster. His trial is scheduled to begin on July 23 at Berlin’s Tiergarten district court.
The case has sparked intense debate across the political spectrum in Germany. Free speech advocates, including right-leaning comedian Gerd Buurmann, have criticized the prosecution.
“It’s not okay that a satirist is taken to court just for saying something. What he said is disgusting, but he should be allowed to say it,” Buurmann argued.
Others, however, support the legal action, saying it sets a clear limit on what’s acceptable in digital spaces and reinforces that “the internet is not a lawless zone.”
One of the loudest critics was Elon Musk, who took to X (formerly Twitter) to condemn the comments. He directly addressed then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz, saying:
“Someone wishing death on the leading US presidential candidate and myself is paid to do so by the German government,”
and followed it with a pointed question:
“Was ist das?” [What is that?]
The incident echoes a similar free speech controversy in 2016, when German satirist Jan Böhmermann faced criminal charges for insulting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in a poem aired on TV. The poem mockingly referenced Erdoğan’s hygiene and personal behavior in vulgar terms, invoking an obscure German law against insulting foreign leaders.
Then-Chancellor Angela Merkel personally allowed the prosecution to proceed, sparking international debate. Böhmermann later accused her of sacrificing him to “a neurotic despot” and likened himself to a German version of dissident artist Ai Weiwei. The case was ultimately dropped and the law in question was later repealed.
As Hotz’s trial approaches, it reignites ongoing questions about the limits of satire, hate speech, and free expression in modern Germany.
Source: The Telegraph
