But NSF’s taxpayer funding for this potential automated censorship is only half of the story. The Committee and the Select Subcommittee have also obtained, via document requests and subpoenas, nonpublic emails and other documents that reveal a years-long, intentional effort by NSF to hide its role in funding these censorship and propaganda tools from media and political scrutiny. From legal scholars, such as Jonathan Turley, to conservative journalists, NSF tracked public criticisms of its work in funding these projects. NSF went so far as to develop a media strategy that considered blacklisting certain American media outlets because they were scrutinizing NSF’s funding of censorship and propaganda tools.
The First Amendment prohibits the government from “abridging the freedom of speech.” 3 Thus, “any law or government policy that reduces that freedom on the [social media] platforms . . . violates the First Amendment.” 4 To inform potential legislation, the Committee and Select Subcommittee have been investigating the Executive Branch’s collusion with thirdparty intermediaries, including universities, non-profits, and businesses, to censor protected speech on social media. The Committee and Subcommittee have uncovered serious violations of the First Amendment throughout the Executive Branch, including:
The Biden White House directly coercing large social media companies, such as Facebook, to censor true information, memes, and satire, eventually leading Facebook to change its content moderation policies;
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Banning phones and the Internet for kids would mean that everything they get outside the family is from official authority figures, which would make everything worse. Seriously, check out today’s authority figures.