All Americans, regardless of their political party, once believed in the universal right to free speech, but over the past seven years the opposite has become true.
When the country elected Donald Trump as president against all odds, the media lost their minds. First they blamed Russian collusion. When courts disproved that lie, media outlets blamed misinformation: they simply couldn’t fathom why any American wouldn’t want Hillary Clinton as president.
Hillary Clinton herself publicly argued in 2018 for the need to police social media companies. “We should all care about how social media platforms play a part in our democratic process. Because unless it’s addressed it will happen again,” she said. “We owe it to our democracy to get this right, and fast.”
Since then, the Democrats have made a concerted effort to use their political power to keep the opposition from speaking. Former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki once spoke openly about the Biden administration’s policy to censor speech on social media, contending that platforms such as Facebook must “take faster action against harmful posts.”
In this statement, Psaki didn’t decry these posts as “false” but as “harmful.” What is harmful? Anything the Biden administration dislikes, particularly any opposition to its COVID narrative.
With the White House’s stamp of approval, media sites shadowbanned and suspended countless conservatives for posting information about COVID that turned out to be true. Leftists particularly targeted the lab leak theory to prevent all discussion. It wasn’t until official sources released overwhelming evidence pointing toward the lab leak that social media grudgingly lifted its ban.
The Democrats have made a concerted effort to use their political power to keep the opposition from speaking.
But the precedent had been set. If the government and other powerful institutions reached a consensus on what they believed about a topic, any dissent would be crushed.
Conservatives got a major break in 2022, however, when Elon Musk purchased Twitter and gained access to mountains of information which showed how the Biden administration had censored not just certain topics, but many individuals who they simply disliked. Because Musk brought this information to light, Republican officials filed lawsuits against the White House and waged war on the administration’s broader censorship machine.
United States District Court Judge Terry Doughty also determined on the Fourth of July that the White House likely colluded with Big Tech firms to limit protected speech during COVID. Doughty therefore issued a preliminary injunction barring several administration officials and agencies, such as Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, and all staff members at the Justice Department and FBI, from contacting technology companies in order to suppress free speech.
Judge Doughty wrote that the federal government “seems to have assumed a role similar to an Orwellian ‘Ministry of Truth’” and may have implemented “the most massive attack against free speech” in American history.
This ruling strikes a tremendous blow against the Biden administration’s open policy of abusing government power to shut down debate. This case also highlights the importance of Trump’s victory in 2016: if a Hillary Clinton-appointed judge had presided over this suit, Republicans would not have seen a favorable outcome.
Of course, the Biden administration has appealed this ruling to the Fifth Circuit, but given the current makeup of the federal courts, the ruling will likely be upheld. In fact, many scholars believe the Fifth Circuit is the most conservative appellate circuit in America thanks to Trump’s appointments.
If the government and other powerful institutions reached a consensus on what they believed about a topic, any dissent would be crushed.
But beyond the politics of the day, this decision highlights a timeless truth fundamental to the founding of this country: the government should never be in the business of shutting down speech it hates. Our Founding Fathers never conceived that Americans would want to establish a government agency to police speech. Yet the Biden administration relentlessly attempts to limit discussion that contradicts their chosen narratives.
Doughty’s ruling offers a glimmer of hope, but if Republicans don’t find a way to take back the White house in 2024, the courts will likely change enough to undo this ruling and many others championed by conservatives. We must remain vigilant if we hope to pass freedom to the next generation.
