Famed author J.K. Rowling doesn’t like what Donald Trump says, but she’ll defend his right to say it.
In her speech at the PEN America gala on Monday night, the Harry Potter author addressed a recent petition asking the U.K. government to bar the presumptive Republican presidential nominee from entering the country.
“Now, I find almost everything that Mr. Trump says objectionable. I consider him offensive and bigoted,” Rowling said. “But he has my full support to come to my country and be offensive and bigoted there.”
The parliamentary petition, launched in December, requested that the British government deny Trump entry into the country due to his remarks about Muslims. While the petition remains open, the government has already rejected it, saying it will not bar Trump from visiting the country despite his “divisive” comments.
“The Prime Minister has made clear that he completely disagrees with Donald Trump’s remarks,” the government said in its response. “The Home Secretary has said that Donald Trump’s remarks in relation to Muslims are divisive, unhelpful, and wrong.”
The petition, which remains active until June 8, has more than 585,000 signatures.
Rowling has butted heads with Trump in the past. In December, the author tweeted that comparing Trump to Voldemort, the main antagonist in the Harry Potter series, was unfair—to Voldemort.
How horrible. Voldemort was nowhere near as bad. https://t.co/hFO0XmOpPH
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) December 8, 2015
In defending Trump on Monday night, Rowling said that limiting his right to travel based on what he said would only weaken everyone else’s freedoms.
“If my offended feelings can justify a travel ban on Donald Trump, I have no moral grounds upon which to argue that those offended by feminism, or the fight for transgender rights, or universal suffrage, should not oppress campaigners for those causes,” Rowling said. “If you seek the removal of freedom from an opponent simply because they have offended you, you have crossed the line to stand alongside tyrants who imprison, torture, and kill with exactly the same justification.”
