Elon Musk’s “Twitter Files” revealed something many Conservatives already believed was true: government officials in the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and other agencies worked together to moderate or censor conservative voices. While private companies have a right to content moderation, it blurs the lines when government officials help decide what is censored and what is not.
Former President Donald Trump was the first world leader in modern history to be censored and banned on social media. On Thursday, December 15, he released a video vowing to sign an executive order on the subject if reelected president in 2024. The order, he says, would prohibit the government from colluding with any organization or individual that limited free speech rights.
Trump Promises To Stop Censorship
In the wake of the Twitter Files, the former president has moved to make his position clear to the American people. In his message, Trump promised to end left-wing censorship and fight to reclaim Americans’ free speech rights if they put him back in the White House in 2024. He noted the importance of the cause existed because Big Tech and the government worked together to take it away. The former commander-in-chief stated that Americans “don’t have a free country” without free speech. He called it the most fundamental of rights and noted if it’s abolished, all other liberties and freedoms will follow.
Trump stated he would sign an executive order within hours of his first day in the Oval Office. It would ban any federal agency from colluding with any business or individual to “censor, limit, categorize, or impede the lawful speech of American citizens.”
How Would the Former President Fight Censorship?
The former president didn’t stop there. In addition, among other items, Trump promised to:
- Prohibit the executive branch from spending taxpayer dollars to label speech as misinformation or disinformation.
- Remove any federal bureaucrat from their job who engaged in censoring Americans.
- Demand the Biden administration and Big Tech companies preserve their communications.
- Order the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate online censorship and prosecute any crimes discovered.
- Revise Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act that shields Big Tech from civil lawsuits over user-generated content hosted on their platforms.
- Strip federal funding from tax-exempt organizations and academic institutions that engage in censorship.
- Impose a 7-year wait period before government employees can accept a job at a Big Tech firm.
For some, the 7-year cooling-off period is an important issue. Recently, Tucker Carlson revealed that 15 people who once worked for government agencies worked at the upper echelons of Twitter before Musk took over the company.
Not only is censorship a political issue, but it’s also a legal one. The Supreme Court (SCOTUS) is set to hear two cases this term about Section 230.
