Excuse the hackneyed lift from “The Princess Bride,” clearly the greatest love story ever told. But it’s apt: President Trump and his Republican allies keep decrying “censorship” by others – in particular, their political opponents and anyone who says anything unfavorable about them – while actually doing it themselves.
Let’s start with Congress. This week, the House Judiciary Committee is conducting its fourth hearing addressing what it calls “The Censorship-Industrial Complex.” The first three hearings and a related report on this topic were conducted under titles about “the weaponization of the federal government.” (In fact, as of this writing, all three of the witnesses announced for this week’s hearing have testified to the Committee before.) In the Committee’s view, this “industrial complex” refers to the Biden administration, technology platforms, academic institutions, researchers, advocacy groups, advertisers and their agencies, and the media collaborating to suppress speech, especially online. This is about more than social media companies “censoring conservative voices” (a claim refuted by reams of academic and social science research). Now, anyone who calls out hate speech or false information, writes unfavorably about the President or the administration, or tries to avoid association with toxic content is part of the “complex.”
This week’s Congressional hearing is only part of an orchestrated campaign across the branches of the Republican-led federal government to suppress unfavorable information, manipulate citizens, and allow the continued use of false information as a political strategy to gain power. Far from being the defenders of free speech, these actors are the ones leading the attack on it. And while Democratic staff on the House Judiciary Committee issued their own report, “The Delusion of Collusion: The Republican Effort to Weaponize Antitrust and Undermine Free Speech,” late last year, it will take a concerted effort across stakeholders to counter the anti-democratic threat President Trump and his allies represent.
The Censorship the First Amendment Prohibits Refers to Government
Democracy 101: Censorship refers to the use of government force to suppress speech. That is, the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution prohibits the government from restricting freedom of speech, press, religion, and association. As George Washington Law School professor Dr. Mary Anne Franks noted at yet another Republican-led hearing on this topic (from the House Small Business Committee):
“The First Amendment does not protect speech from criticism or competition. It does not guarantee any speaker a platform or a profit. The same First Amendment that protects one person’s right to speak also protects the right of another person to reject, to discredit, or ignore that speech. The fact that critical speech may lead to negative consequences for those who are criticized, such as a decline in popularity or in revenue merely indicates that the speech is effective, not that it is censorship.
Competition is not censorship.
Counterspeech is not censorship.
Research is not censorship.
Providing information to businesses about other businesses is not censorship.
Efforts to convince consumers, advertisers, and the public that certain content is false, fraudulent, harmful, extremist, harassing or exploitative, is not censorship.”
We had hoped that the recent Supreme Court decision in Murthy v. Missouri would bring an end to the baseless claims of “censorship” collaboration between the Biden administration and social media companies, at least. In the case, the conservative-majority Court found no connection between government communication and platforms’ content moderation of the plaintiffs’ posts. In other words, the alleged “censorship” never happened.
Despite Claiming To Oppose Censorship, the Trump Administration Keeps Doing It
Despite that Supreme Court decision, on the very day of his inauguration, President Trump signed an executive order, “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship.” In it, he reiterated the “right of the American people to engage in constitutionally protected speech” and prohibited federal employees from abridging free speech. Since then, while President Trump and his allies keep talking about how awful censorship is, they also keep doing it.
So far, much of the new administration’s most public censorious activity is originating in the Federal Communications Commission. For example, in January, incoming FCC Chairman Brendan Carr announced that he was launching an investigation into whether PBS and NPR member stations have violated FCC rules through their underwriting practices, saying this could inform congressional funding decisions. Days later, right on cue, Chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s “Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE)” Subcommittee, Marjorie Taylor Greene, notified the leaders of PBS and NPR that she, too, was launching an investigation, “assessing the value of continued federal funding of these entities.” Republican efforts to defund public media are, as they say, “old news,” but this time the targets’ editorial choices have been brought into the fight. In her letter to NPR, Rep. Greene cited NPR’s decision not to report on the (I can’t believe I have to type these words again) Hunter Biden laptop story. In the letter to PBS, Rep. Greene cited PBS reporting on DOGE co-founder Elon Musk giving “what appeared” to be a Nazi salute. She accused both NPR and PBS of reporting for “a narrow slice of like-minded individuals and ideological interest groups.” Congress threatening to withdraw funding due to media organizations’ editorial choices meets the definition of censorship.
FCC Chairman Carr also recently reinstated bias complaints on behalf of Donald Trump against three network TV broadcasters on grounds they were partial to Kamala Harris. These were against ABC (for fact-checking President Trump’s statements during the debate with then-Vice President Harris), NBC (for Harris’s brief appearance on “Saturday Night Live”), and CBS (for editing of Harris’s “60 Minutes” interview). Prior FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel had dismissed these complaints (and one lodged against a station owned by Fox) because “they seek to weaponize the licensing authority of the FCC in a way that is fundamentally at odds with the First Amendment.” For the case against CBS, Chairman Carr explicitly tied a request to Paramount for a full transcript and recording of the interview with Harris to the agency’s review of Paramount’s much-wanted merger with Skydance Media. (Notably, Chairman Carr did not choose to reinstate the defamation complaint lodged against Fox News, even though the reporting in question has already been judged to actually be false.) Threatening to withhold government approval for a commercial transaction due to editorial decisions certainly qualifies as censorship. (And from the “you-can’t-make-this-up” department, four years ago Commissioner Carr, in a statement, described letters from two Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee to cable companies inquiring about their coverage decisions “a chilling transgression of the free speech rights that every media outlet in this country enjoys.” He noted further at that time that, “A newsroom’s decision about what stories to cover and how to frame them should be beyond the reach of any government official, not targeted by them.”)
As recently as the past few days, it’s been reported that Chairman Carr has volleyed “a letter of inquiry, a formal investigation” at San Francisco-based radio station KCBS over its coverage of the administration’s mass deportation raids in California. In this case, as well, Chairman Carr has made threatening statements about how the station’s reporting “could possibly be consistent with its public interest obligations.” Perhaps not coincidentally, Carr had earlier promised to “take a very hard” look at the FCC’s 2024 decision to approve the bankruptcy reorganization of Audacy, KCBS’ corporate parent, which has ties to George Soros.
Chairman Carr has also threatened social media platforms with reform to Section 230, which shields interactive service companies from liability for the content posted by their users. In Carr’s chapter in the “Project 2025” Presidential Transition Project, he noted that the FCC should “interpret” Section 230 in ways that narrow its protections. His goal is to force social media platforms to moderate less content. But free expression is harmed, not helped, by proposals that seek to limit the content moderation choices of major platforms.
These threats from the FCC represent only one wave of attacks on news organizations, social media platforms, and others coming from the current administration. President Trump sued the Des Moines Register for reporting on a poll that showed he was running behind Kamala Harris in the presidential election. Vice President JD Vance has also threatened digital platforms for their content moderation practices, saying threateningly in an interview that they “can stop engaging in censorship, and if they don’t… Donald Trump’s leadership is not going to look too kindly on them.”
Then there are the cancellations of government agency subscriptions to news outlets that cover political events (under the false pretense that these outlets are receiving “government funds” to influence coverage), naming of reporters on X (formerly Twitter) and Truth Social, and kicking unfriendly news outlets out of press briefings at the White House and the Pentagon in favor of pro-Trump outlets in a brand-new “media rotation policy.” (I don’t have the room or the energy to cover the book bans; the wiping of references to diversity, equity, and inclusion; and the keyword scraping of government documents, but in our view, they are all part of the same campaign, designed to prevent citizens from accessing information contrary to the administration’s aims.)
Where Trump officials or Congress have not acted directly, President Trump’s allies have stepped in to further the censorship agenda. They are using defamation suits or SLAPPs – strategic lawsuits against public participation, or civil lawsuits designed to silence or intimidate people who speak out on issues of public concern – to silence critics. Elon Musk – now a “special government employee” – sued Media Matters for “consumer fraud” when the research organization reported on advertisers whose ads were running adjacent to toxic content on X, the platform Musk now owns. And last week, a huge Trump donor went after the Big Kahuna: Steve Wynn filed a petition asking the Supreme Court to overturn the landmark 1964 decision in New York Times v. Sullivan, which protects the media’s ability to aggressively cover public officials.
These orchestrated attacks have at least three impacts: ending unfavorable reporting by individual organizations, intimidating others into silence, and eroding trust in media organizations among the general public. And worst of all – it’s working. Under pressure and threat of retaliation, national media organizations are abandoning their own constitutionally protected rights by settling what are widely considered winnable lawsuits filed by or on behalf of President Trump. ABC, Meta, and potentially CBS all settled dubious lawsuits to maintain good relations with the public officials who are bullying them, or to protect commercial opportunities. And even before the election results were known, the owners of The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times killed endorsements of Kamala Harris over Donald Trump prepared by their editorial boards. Whether free expression rights are seized or surrendered, the impact is the same.
Countering Censorship with Collective Action
With individual entities facing significant consequences for non-compliance, as one Harvard professor recently noted, civil society faces a collective action problem. Here are some strategies Public Knowledge supports for policymakers and the public to counter this censorship campaign:
- Asking Democratic members of Congress – as we have done for this week’s hearing – to hold their colleagues accountable for censoring opposing viewpoints and inducing a media environment more suited to an autocratic government. There is a straight line from antagonistic hearings and FCC threats to assaults on democratic institutions.
- Partnering with other civil society organizations to protect press freedom, including by advocating for federal anti-SLAPP legislation in Congress.
- Advocating for policy solutions to support local news, with an emphasis on news production through independent, community-invested news organizations.
- Supporting digital and media literacy in your community as core competencies, from early education through adult learning.
- Advocating for both editorial independence and continued funding for public media.
- Fighting FCC abuses of power by supporting targeted lawsuits that challenge the misuse of the FCC for political purposes.
- Sharing instances of censorious activity you see from policymakers at the FCC and on the Hill with PK – to equip us with stories of the harmful effects locally that can be shared with policymakers.
This week, in her keynote presentation at the internet policy conference State of the Net, FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez noted, “Instead of obsessing over partisan culture wars, the FCC must remain focused on expanding connectivity, promoting competition and innovation, securing our networks, and supporting a strong, independent media ecosystem. We must continue to uphold the FCC’s long standing pillars of media policy: preserving localism, competition, and diversity in broadcast media. With mis- and disinformation on the rise, local journalism is as important as ever. I will continue to highlight the media literacy education efforts and tools that consumers can use to determine the truthfulness of information about the issues that matter most to them.”
If the FCC and other agencies, Congress, and courts can unite behind that premise, it will be a true step forward for free speech.