Imagine stepping off a plane in London, Paris, or Rio de Janeiro, excited for a vacation or business trip, only for it to devolve into handcuffs, detention, confiscated electronics and a prison sentence.
Your offense? You posted from your kitchen about U.K. immigration policies or maybe you called a German politician a name or just wrote something critical about a certain Brazilian Supreme Court Justice. This isn’t dystopian fiction or some far-off fever dream.
The UK government arrested over 12,000 people in 2022 and 2023 under two of the country’s speech policing laws. In February, Germany conducted 50 pre-dawn armed raids in one day over online speech. In at least one case, police officers confiscated a man’s devices because of a meme he posted on social media. Similar persecution has occurred in Romania, France and Finland.
And that’s just what these countries are doing to their own citizens. Make no mistake, many of America’s so-called allies have made it their mission to bring censorship and punishment to our shores.
Last year, U.K. Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley threatened to “throw the full force of the law” at foreigners for their online speech. Just before the 2024 U.S. elections, a European Union Commissioner warned Donald Trump and Elon Musk that they better not say anything that would be illegal in the EU during an X interview on American soil. And in February 2024, Brazil issued an arrest warrant for an American citizen after trying to censor her speech.
The EU and the U.K. are also cajoling Big Tech companies to carry out their anti-free speech push. The EU alone has fined Big Tech companies over $30 billion, according to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. U.K. Digital Secretary Nadine Dorries even repeatedly suggested Zuckerberg could be jailed if Meta did not silence enough speech. (RELATED: Keir Starmer Claims ‘We’re Not Censoring Anyone’ In Country Arresting Citizens For Tweets)
France threw Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in prison before allegedly pressuring him to censor content related to the Romanian elections. And Musk is currently under investigation by both the EU and France, which could lead to a massive fine or a countrywide platform ban.
These aren’t isolated incidents. They’re part of a mounting global assault on free speech.
For years, foreign censors have held all the leverage and been able to quietly request that American social media companies censor specific content without users or the U.S. government ever knowing. But Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and the House Judiciary Committee are putting an end to the secrecy.
Americans can now keep tabs on when foreign countries are turning the screws on our social media companies to change their policies or censor our citizens. The committee subpoenaed Big Tech companies to turn over all examples of such pressure on an ongoing basis, and it continues to receive new evidence.
Disturbingly, Jordan has also gained access to documents showing that the EU is even trying to make social media companies change their terms and conditions to be more in accordance with its local anti-free speech laws. This could impose anti-speech European values on all platform users, including free-speech-loving Americans. (RELATED: UK’s Censorship Dystopia Hints At The Future Kamala Wants For Conservatives)
The Trump administration has made free speech a number one priority both domestically and as a key element of its foreign policy.
Just last week, President Trump used the Global Magnitsky Act to impose sanctions on Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes for his aggressive efforts pressing platforms to silence American citizens. This human rights law bars De Moraes from doing business with Americans and American institutions and prohibits him from entering the United States.
De Moraes should be the first of many foreign leaders to feel the full impact of Global Magnitsky sanctions.
If the bureaucrats in London, Paris, Berlin and Brussels truly hate our free speech values, our citizens, and our tech companies this much, is it too much to ask that they refrain from visiting or doing business with us?
Trump is over the target and needs to continue to do everything in his power to protect American citizens and companies abroad.
We are in a fight over whose values will prevail. One side is actively working to silence their political opponents and lock them up without a trial. The other believes that the freedom of speech shall not be infringed. American values must win.
Gabriela Pariseau is Associate Editor at the Media Research Center’s Free Speech America. Tom Olohan is a staff writer at Free Speech America.
