Non-Americans are certainly protected by the Constitution while in the US, but I thought there was still a legal debate about whether the US Constitution fully applies to foreign nationals while outside the US. Hasn't that long been the legal excuse used for things like international mass surveillance and what goes on in Guantanamo Bay?
The First Amendment doesn't apply to anyone while outside the US. A US citizen in Saudi Arabia doesn't have First Amendment protections there.
For the US to prosecute Assange, they have to prosecute him in the US, where he does enjoy First Amendment protections, as the First Amendment limits what Congress (and via the Fourteenth, state/local as well) can do.
I think you are misinterpreting the question. The US Constitution obviously has no legal impact on the laws of Saudi Arabia. The question is whether the US government needs to follow the US Constitution when dealing with a non-US citizen on non-US soil.
There seems to be a precedent that US citizens have different legal protections from the US government while abroad when compared with non-citizens. That is why US citizens involved with Al-Qaeda, ISIS, or similar hostile organizations will occasionally receive a domestic trial in the criminal justice system while non-citizens generally only face military trials if anything.
> There seems to be a precedent that US citizens have different legal protections from the US government while abroad when compared with non-citizens.
It's an interesting situation, as there's counter-examples; the Constitution doesn't, for example, appear to permit assassinations (certainly not of citizens without a trial), but they went ahead and droned Anwar al-Awlaki without any apparent legal consequences.
You seem to willingly confusing "assassinations" with "acts of war".
Anwar Al-Awlaki was unquestionably an enemy combatant due to his overt belonging to a non-state actor engaged in military combat with the United States.
If a person is on trial in the U.S. for breaking U.S. law, then U.S. constitutional protections apply— regardless of citizenship or where the alleged crime took place.
> The First Amendment doesn't apply to anyone while outside the US. A US citizen in Saudi Arabia doesn't have First Amendment protections there.
First Amendment deals with US federal government and states.
Neither the federal government nor the states can prosecute you for free speech you engage in as US citizen or resident while in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Arabian government might choose to prosecute you, but the first amendment does prohibit the US government from prosecuting you for speech made overseas as well as on US soil.
An american journalist is living in Brazil and writes an article critical of the US government. The US government can not prosecute them simply because they wrote the article while out of the country.
