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New York Post


September 4, 2023
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CHILLING REVELATIONS ON THE RISE OF FEDS’ ORWELLIAN SPEECH POLICE

By
Benjamin Weingarten


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Back to Reading
July 4, 2023 6:39pm
Updated
July 4, 2023 6:39pm
On Tuesday, a blockbuster preliminary injunction from a federal judge barring
contact between Team Biden and social-media companies, cited evidence of a
"massive effort" by the White House and federal agencies to "suppress speech
based on its content." AFP via Getty Images


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Imagine an America where the feds surge actual speech police wherever chatter on
social media questions the integrity of the vote — speech police who then take
to the airwaves to attack those making the claims.

If this sounds far-fetched, consider that last summer a national-security agency
actually mulled the idea of deploying a “rapid response team” to local
jurisdictions to help election officials fend off “mis-, dis- and
mal-information” (MDM)-related “threats,” including through communications — an
idea one federal official called “fascinating.”

That revelation comes from a new report from the House Weaponization
Subcommittee on a little-known Homeland Security sub-agency called the
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

And it was followed Tuesday by a blockbuster preliminary injunction from a
federal judge barring contact between Team Biden and social-media companies, who
cited evidence of a “massive effort” by the White House and federal agencies to
“suppress speech based on its content.”   

Despite its anonymity, CISA has served as the linchpin of government-led speech
policing.

It has coordinated with federal agencies and a coterie of often federally funded
“anti-disinformation” NGOs to chide, cajole and collude with Big Tech companies
to impose a mass public-private surveillance and censorship regime on the
American people.

CISA Director Jen Easterly has said “cognitive infrastructure” — that is, what
people think — is “most critical.”AP

That regime has silenced those who voice unauthorized opinions and even
inconvenient facts on social-media platforms under the banner of combatting
“dangerous” MDM.

This amounts to a conspiracy to violate the First Amendment, resulting in
rampant election interference, the stifling of crucial debates for example on
COVID-19 and the chilling of incalculable amounts of speech on much else — all
in service of ruling class power.

Now House Republicans are striking back; the subcommittee’s report is part of
the backlash.

By exposing CISA and its partners’ centrality to the censorship regime,
Republicans are taking the first step towards terminating it.

The report shows, during the 2020 presidential contest, CISA collected and
reported offending content Americans posted about elections to social media
companies, which often censored it — a process known as “switchboarding.”Getty
Images

The report tells of how an agency tasked with combatting foreign cyberattacks
and defending the grid came to target Americans’ tweets questioning mass mail-in
balloting as if they were mini-terrorist attacks on “cognitive infrastructure.”

CISA Director Jen Easterly has said “cognitive infrastructure” — that is, what
people think — is “most critical,” hence the need for her agency to control
Americans’ speech.

Consistent with this view, as the report shows, during the 2020 presidential
contest, CISA collected and reported offending content Americans posted about
elections to social media companies, which often censored it — a process known
as “switchboarding.”

During and after that election, CISA colluded extensively with cut-outs, one of
which was CISA-funded, to get content purged.

There have been specific instances of a CISA-funded partner working to get
posts, including those of Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, taken down by social-media
companies.REUTERS

As its efforts grew more ambitious, CISA formalized its coordination with the
cut-outs and social-media companies, convening an Orwellian subcommittee for
MDM.

The report adds rich color to this underreported story.

It shows CISA and its partners casting aside concerns about targeting Americans’
speech, even as some expressed surprise and concern.

It shows specific instances of a CISA-funded partner working to get posts,
including those of Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, taken down by social-media
companies.

Perhaps most important, the report shows CISA & Co. knew what the sub-agency was
doing was unlawful and “routinely attempted to conceive methods” to
“surreptitiously outsource its surveillance and censorship to non-governmental
third parties.”

“It’s only a matter of time before someone realizes we exist and starts asking
about our work,” a former CIA lawyer serving on the MDM Subcommittee warned in a
May 2022 email.

CISA eventually scrapped the subcommittee and scrubbed evidence of its
domestic-speech targeting.

The cover-up would seem to be an admission of guilt.

We still don’t know the full scope of any underlying crimes, but Congress’
probes may reveal them.

That oversight is critical, because lawmakers need a comprehensive picture of
the surveillance and censorship regime to inform legislation to dismantle it.

Those efforts in fact have already begun.

The House Armed Services Committee recently adopted an amendment to its annual
National Defense Authorization Act halting federal funding to purported
anti-disinformation outfits that have gotten conservative outlets blacklisted
and demonetized.

103
What do you think? Post a comment.

The Homeland Security Committee adopted an amendment in its annual
appropriations bill — one I supported, including in testimony — defunding any
DHS speech-policing activities.

These efforts are imperative to saving free speech in America.

Benjamin Weingarten, editor at large at RealClearInvestigations, recently
testified before the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Oversight,
Investigations and Accountability on federal speech-policing.  




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Filed under
 * 2020 presidential election
 * congress
 * cybersecurity
 * department of homeland security
 * disinformation
 * free speech
 * George Orwell
 * republicans
 * social media
 * speech
 * ted cruz
 * 7/4/23

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