Trump administration to close controversial censorship office
The Trump administration has announced the closure of a controversial State Department office created during the Biden administration, known as the Counter Foreign Facts Manipulation and Interference framework. Originally established to combat disinformation from foreign adversaries, the office allegedly shifted focus under Biden to censor political speech, targeting domestic viewpoints framed as foreign propaganda. Acting Under Secretary of State darren Beattie confirmed the dismantling of the office, which had previously been known as the Global Engagement Center. The closure was directed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and aligned with Trump’s Executive Order aimed at restoring free speech and ending federal censorship. The framework’s prolonged shutdown was due to unresolved international cooperation agreements.Critics, including Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and several conservative media outlets, had sued the office over alleged censorship activities, highlighting concerns about government interference in constitutionally protected speech.
Trump administration to close State Department office criticized for Biden-era censorship
The Trump administration announced it will close a controversial Biden-era censorship office ostensibly used to counter malicious messaging from foreign actors.
The State Department’s Office of Public Diplomacy said it will dismantle the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference framework, Acting Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Darren Beattie first told the Daily Wire. The Washington Examiner confirmed the development.
The framework was established to counter disinformation from hostile foreign actors, such as terrorist groups. The Trump State Department alleged that under former President Joe Biden, it quickly “devolved into tools for political censorship instead of protecting Americans from foreign adversarial propaganda.”
The Washington Examiner reached out to the State Department for further comment.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio had ordered the closure of the framework back in May, but the process was only completed this week. It cited one of Trump’s first acts as president, the Jan. 20 Executive Order on Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship, as justification.
“Under the guise of combatting ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ and ‘malinformation,’ the Federal Government infringed on the constitutionally protected speech rights of American citizens across the United States in a manner that advanced the Government’s preferred narrative about significant matters of public debate. Government censorship of speech is intolerable in a free society,” the EO read.
The framework took so long to close due to a number of “loose ends” that needed to be tied up, including agreements with foreign governments to “facilitate and provide a framework for cooperation on mutual objectives, including principally combating so-called ‘disinformation,’” Beattie explained.
He said that the framework, previously known as the Global Engagement Center, had repeatedly directly appealed to tech companies to censor information from domestic users.
PARTISANS ON BOTH SIDES STOKE FEARS OF ‘MISINFORMATION,’ BUT IT’S HARD TO DEFINE
“This came out in numerous instances in the Twitter files and, on other occasions,” Beattie explained. “And so the GEC would do that, but they would also have an indirect approach to censorship whereby they would fund third-party organizations that would engage in activity from facilitating the demonetization of conservative sites to generally castigating certain narrative perspectives on COVID, on immigration, on foreign policy, as simply malign as a matter of foreign influence when in fact these were entirely legitimate points of view that often came from Americans.”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Daily Wire, and the Federalist, had sued the GEC last year over alleged censorship.
Ross O’Keefe contributed to this report.
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