In the last 24, hours members of Congress sent two letters seeking information on different ways government employees commandeer private organizations to censor Americans’ speech online.
On Thursday, Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., asked executives at Google, Instagram, Meta, Microsoft, Snapchat, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter) to disclose government demands for removing Americans’ speech from their platforms. On Friday, the House Oversight Committee sought additional records from NewsGuard, a federally funded company that works to eliminate readership and revenue for outlets that report information that contradicts Democrat narratives.
Schmitt’s letter asks the social media monopolies to disclose if their companies have “experienced any pressure from government actors to censor user content in recent weeks,” to indicate whether they have “changed any policies in the last twelve months related to election integrity,” and to share any records these companies keep of when public officials and political parties ask the companies to limit or remove social media posts or hashtags.
Investigative journalism such as the Twitter Files and litigation in Murthy v. Missouri have revealed that dozens of federal agencies all the way up to the White House constantly pressure social media monopolies to remove posts and hashtags sharing government-disfavored ideas. The platforms now also deploy artificial intelligence to limit politically disfavored speech online. These disfavored ideas include observations that men and women are different, concerns about election integrity, or information that indicates people from different cultures sometimes live differently.
NEITHER THE TIMES NOR ANY OTHER MAJOR NEWS OUTLET HAS EVER ACKNOWLEDGED
