By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Republican U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order that he said was aimed at “restoring freedom of speech and ending federal censorship.”
WHY IT’S IMPORTANT
Trump and his Republican allies had accused the administration of Democratic former President Joe Biden of encouraging suppression of free speech on online platforms.
Democrats say they urged tech platforms to combat misinformation and disinformation online, particularly on issues like vaccines and elections, while some rights experts have also raised concerns about the spread of online hate speech, particularly against minority groups.
KEY QUOTES
“Over the last 4 years, the previous administration trampled free speech rights by censoring Americans’ speech on online platforms, often by exerting substantial coercive pressure on third parties, such as social media companies, to moderate, de-platform, or otherwise suppress speech that the Federal Government did not approve,” the White House said on Monday.
“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 White House added.
CONTEXT
Trump, who took office on Monday, himself faced social media restrictions after an attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, following his loss in the 2020 election to Biden.
Billionaire Elon Musk, a Trump ally, has since bought X, formerly called Twitter, where Trump’s account was restored and content moderation loosened after Musk’s purchase.
In recent weeks, Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg met Trump and the social media company has scrapped its U.S. fact-checking program and reduced curbs on discussions around contentious topics such as immigration and gender identity.
The U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment protects free speech and applies to government policies.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington, editing by Chris Sanders and Deepa Babington)
