Jamie Lee Curtis, Robert De Niro lead celebrities in Constitution oath video

A group of left-wing celebrities and legal figures released a video on Constitution Day, Sept. 17, reciting an oath to “support and defend the Constitution,” part of a new campaign from the American Constitution Society that quickly drew mockery from conservative commentators online.

The video features actors Jamie Lee Curtis, Robert De Niro, Noah Wyle and Martin Sheen alongside retired federal appeals judge J. Michael Luttig and retired Army Col. Isaiah “Ike” Wilson III. Each participant introduces themselves before the group recites language adapted from the oath used by federal officeholders, closing with Ms. Curtis declaring, “I am proud to affirm my oath to the Constitution.”

The recitation omits the phrase “so help me God,” found in the standard oath prescribed by law for federal officeholders. That’s not necessarily a deviation from convention, though: The statute itself allows a person to “affirm” rather than “swear,” and a federal regulation makes the phrase optional even in the citizenship oath taken by new Americans, so its absence outside a formal government proceeding isn’t inherently notable.

The video is part of The Oath Project, which ACS President Phil Brest announced in a message to supporters as “a nonpartisan civic initiative inviting people across the country” to film and share their own oath videos. Mr. Brest asked participants to take the pledge “not as a statement of party or ideology,” framing it as a shared commitment to the founding document rather than a partisan statement.

ACS has named a broader roster of additional participants, including Barbra Streisand, John Lithgow, Edward James Olmos, Joan Jett, Tony Goldwyn, legal scholars Barbara McQuade and Laurence Tribe, retired judges Sue Bell Cobb and Carol Ann Beier, and former state attorneys general Matt Platkin of New Jersey and Brian Frosh of Maryland, both of whom served in office as Democrats. USA Journal, reporting separately on the campaign, noted that Ms. Curtis, Mr. De Niro, Mr. Sheen, Mr. Wyle and Ms. Streisand are all publicly identified with left-leaning politics.

The video drew swift pushback online. Conservative commentator Joel Pollak wrote that “nothing is funnier than lefties claiming they love the Constitution,” and other social media users compared the effort to past celebrity political videos, including a widely mocked 2016 anti-Trump ad featuring similar Hollywood figures.