On March 24, the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution held a hearing on the “Censorship Industrial Complex,” where senators and witnesses expressed divergent views on risks to First Amendment rights.  Senator Eric Schmitt (R-MO), the Subcommittee Chair, began the hearing by warning that the “vast censorship enterprise that the Biden Administration built” has expanded into an “alliance of activists, academics, journalists, big tech companies, and federal bureaucrats” that uses “novel tools and technologies of the 21st century” to silence critics.  Senator Peter Welch (D-VT), the Ranking Member of the Subcommittee, expressed skepticism about alleged censorship by the Biden Administration and social media companies, citing the Supreme Court’s 2024 opinion in Murthy v. Missouri, and accused the Trump Administration of causing “real suppression of free speech.”

The witnesses at the hearing, including law professors, journalists, and an attorney from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, expressed contrasting views on the state of free expression and risks of censorship.  Mollie Hemingway, the Editor-in-Chief of The Federalist, argued that federal and state governments “fund and promote censorship and blacklisting technology” to undermine free speech in coordination with universities, non-profit entities, and technology companies.  Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor, and Benjamin Weingarten, an investigative journalist, raised similar censorship concerns, with Turley arguing that a “cottage industry of disinformation experts” had “monetized censorship” and adding that the EU’s Digital Services Act presents a “new, emerging threat” to First Amendment rights.Continue Reading Senate Judiciary Subcommittee Holds Hearing on the “Censorship Industrial Complex”