Products are selected by our editors, we may earn commission from links on this page.
Perry County, Tennessee will pay $835,000 to settle a federal lawsuit filed by Larry Bushart, a 61-year-old retired police officer who spent 37 days in jail after posting Facebook memes that joked about the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Bushart was arrested in September, refused to take down the posts, had his bail set at $2 million, and lost his post-retirement job during his time behind bars. He also missed his wedding anniversary and the birth of his granddaughter. Authorities dropped the felony charge against him in October. He filed a federal lawsuit in December against Perry County, its sheriff, and the investigator who obtained the arrest warrant.
“I am pleased my First Amendment rights have been vindicated,” Bushart said in a statement announcing the settlement Wednesday. “The people’s freedom to participate in civil discourse is crucial to a healthy democracy. I am looking forward to moving on and spending time with my family.” The settlement was reached with the help of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which assisted in representing Bushart. Perry County Mayor John Carroll did not respond to a request for comment seeking an interview by the time of reporting.
Bushart’s case drew national attention because it was a rare instance in which online speech about a public figure’s death led to a criminal prosecution and a multi-week jail stay. While many Americans lost jobs over social media comments about Kirk’s death, being criminally charged and jailed for a Facebook meme was an outcome that legal observers and First Amendment advocates described as an extraordinary and unconstitutional response to protected speech. The $835,000 settlement and the dropped felony charge together represent a significant legal vindication for Bushart, even as the county has not publicly acknowledged wrongdoing.
What Bushart Posted and How It Led to an Arrest
The meme at the center of Bushart’s arrest read “This seems relevant today…” and featured President Donald Trump alongside the words “We have to get over it.” The meme identified that quote as something Trump said in 2024 following a school shooting at Iowa’s Perry High School. Bushart posted it after Kirk was killed, in the context of commenting on the public reaction to Kirk’s death. Perry County, which is near Bushart’s home, held a candlelight vigil for Kirk, and local residents were described by the sheriff as alarmed by the posts.
Perry County Sheriff Nick Weems acknowledged publicly that most of Bushart’s posts were lawful free speech. He said residents became alarmed specifically by the school shooting meme because they feared Bushart was threatening a local school also named Perry County High School, even though Weems said he personally knew the meme referred to a school in Iowa. “Investigators believe Bushart was fully aware of the fear his post would cause and intentionally sought to create hysteria within the community,” Weems said in a statement to The Tennessean. That justification became the basis for the felony charge.
The legal problem with that justification is that Weems himself admitted knowing the meme referenced Iowa’s Perry High School, not the local Tennessee school. That admission undermined the argument that the post constituted a credible threat to a local institution. A felony charge obtained on the basis of community alarm about a post the arresting sheriff acknowledged was referencing an out-of-state school, combined with a $2 million bail for a retired police officer who had posted a political meme on Facebook, is what prompted the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression to take the case and what ultimately led to both the dropped charge and the $835,000 settlement.
What the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Said and Why It Matters
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, known as FIRE, is a nonprofit organization that litigates First Amendment cases across the United States. Its involvement in Bushart’s case brought legal resources and national visibility to a situation that might otherwise have remained a local matter. Attorney Cary Davis, who helped represent Bushart, used the settlement announcement to address law enforcement agencies broadly. “It’s in times of turmoil and heightened tensions that our national commitment to free speech is tested the most,” Davis said. “When government officials fail that test, the Constitution exists to hold them accountable.”
Davis’s closing statement was pointed: “Our hope is that Larry’s settlement sends a message to law enforcement across the country: Respect the First Amendment today, or be prepared to pay the price tomorrow.” That framing positions the Bushart case not as an isolated incident but as a precedent-setting outcome intended to deter similar prosecutions elsewhere. A county paying $835,000 to resolve a lawsuit over a Facebook meme arrest is a concrete financial consequence that other jurisdictions can observe and factor into their own decisions about when online speech crosses into prosecutable territory and when it does not.
The case also sits within a broader national context. Bushart’s arrest came during a period of heightened political tensions following Kirk’s death, when law enforcement in conservative communities was responding to public pressure and community grief. The impulse to act in response to community outrage is understandable, but the legal standard for a criminal prosecution, particularly a felony charge carrying $2 million bail, requires more than community alarm. The First Amendment protects speech that upsets, offends, and even disturbs people, and the dropped charge combined with the settlement reflects the legal system ultimately enforcing that protection.
What This Settlement Means for Free Speech and Social Media in America
The Bushart case is one of the most concrete recent examples of how political speech on social media can become a legal flashpoint during periods of intense public emotion. Kirk’s death prompted widespread grief among conservatives and an equally widespread reaction from people who did not share that grief, including posts that were inflammatory, satirical, or mocking. Some of those posts cost people their jobs. Bushart’s case went further, resulting in a criminal prosecution that a court system ultimately could not sustain and that a county government ultimately paid $835,000 to resolve.
The legal principle that emerged from the case is not new, but it required enforcement. Political memes, including ones that reference violence against public figures in the context of commentary or satire, are generally protected speech under the First Amendment. The threshold for criminal prosecution based on online political speech is high, and the standard for obtaining an arrest warrant requires more than community upset or a sheriff’s acknowledgment that residents misread a post he himself understood correctly. Bushart’s 37 days in jail, his lost job, and his missed family milestones are the human cost of that standard not being applied correctly at the outset.
For Americans who post political content on social media, the Bushart case is a reminder that the distance between a Facebook meme and a felony arrest can be shorter than the Constitution intends, particularly in politically charged moments when local officials face pressure to act. It is also a reminder that the legal system, when pushed, can correct those failures, though the correction came only after Bushart had already served more than a month in jail. The $835,000 will not return those 37 days. What it may do, as FIRE’s attorney expressed, is make the next jurisdiction think twice before treating a political post as a criminal matter.