‘The Largest Censorship Operation in Recent American History’: Sen. Schmitt on Big Tech–Government Collusion

Freshman Senator Eric Schmitt, a Republican from Missouri, accused President Joe Biden’s administration of leading “the largest censorship operation in recent American history” through its ties with social media platforms on March 30.

During his testimony to the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, Schmitt commented that “Since taking office, President Biden and his team have labored to suppress viewpoints with which they disagree. And in so doing, they have infringed upon the individual freedoms of millions of Americans.”

Elon Musk recently released some files, named the Twitter files, which confirmed past collaboration between Big Tech and the Federal Government after Twitter was taken over.

As former attorney general of Missouri, Schmitt headed the effort in Missouri v. Biden, which aimed to demonstrate that leading figures in the Federal Government colluded with social media giants to violate American citizens’ First Amendment rights.

During the course of the case’s discovery, which Schwitt claims is “the most important free speech lawsuit of this generation,” Schmitt and his team members, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry and D. John Sauer, the former Missouri deputy attorney general for special litigation, discovered further proof of collusion between Big Tech and the Biden administration.

“The Biden administration has threatened and attacked social media companies so that those social media companies will censor speech the Biden administration dislikes,” Schmitt emphasized in his statement to the panel. (pdf)

Unprecedented Scale of Censorship

Schmitt also spoke to the committee on the topic of Missouri v. Biden, stating that the administration had engaged in “censorship of truthful information on a scale never before seen.”

“Missouri and Louisiana’s discovery showed that the Biden administration’s coordination with social media networks and collaboration with non-governmental organizations to suppress speech was much more widespread and harmful than anyone had ever known,” Schmitt stated.

The case’s findings indicated that Biden attempted to suppress stories that later turned out to be true, such as the Hunter Biden laptop story, the COVID-19 lab leak theory, and the effectiveness of masks.

Schmitt highlighted several communications from the White House to social media platforms, including one saying “please remove this account immediately,” and another stating “we are gravely concerned that your service is one of the top drivers of vaccine hesitancy-period…. We want to know that you’re trying, we want to know how we can help, and we want to know that you’re not playing a shell game with us when we ask you what is going on. This would all be a lot easier if you would just be straight with us.”

Schmitt concludes his statement with “To summarize…we remain concerned t.”