OPINION:
Free speech is under a global threat. In the past, U.S. presidents would deal with our misbehaving allies by leaning on the bully pulpit to encourage better behavior. Donald Trump isn’t afraid to flex America’s muscle to get what he wants: a renewed respect for the right to hold and express a different opinion.
World leaders who oppress Americans for typing nasty tweets risk being cut off from vacationing in the Hamptons or visits to Johns Hopkins Hospital when they need more advanced medical treatment than their socialized health care systems provide. Secretary of State Marco Rubio laid out the administration’s intention last week.
“It is unacceptable for foreign officials to issue or threaten arrest warrants on U.S. citizens or U.S. residents for social media posts on American platforms while physically present on U.S. soil,” Mr. Rubio said.
This policy also will apply to nations that seek to use their laws to badger sites such as Facebook and X to censor content from Americans who aren’t violating U.S. statutes. “We will not tolerate encroachments upon American sovereignty, especially when such encroachments undermine the exercise of our fundamental right to free speech,” Mr. Rubio added.
The European Union recently implemented the Digital Services Act, a continentwide legal framework forcing “very large” online platforms to comply with Brussels bureaucrats’ demands that they delete material they don’t like.
Beginning next month, major U.S. websites must adhere to the European Union’s Code of Conduct on Disinformation, which criminalizes thoughts inconvenient to the European Commission’s leftist, globalist worldview. The penalties are draconian.
According to the legal text, “failure to reply or rectify incorrect, incomplete or misleading information and failure to submit to an inspection” carries a penalty of 1% of annual global income. For Google’s parent company, Alphabet, which made $350 billion last year, that’s $3.5 billion for each perceived offense.
Telegram founder Pavel Durov revealed last month what European bigwigs privately asked him to do. Mr. Durov, a dual EU and Russian citizen, created his encrypted social media platform to accommodate free and open discussions for everyone, regardless of where they live.
“This spring at the Salon des Batailles in the Hotel de Crillon, Nicolas Lerner, head of French intelligence, asked me to ban conservative voices in Romania ahead of elections,” Mr. Durov wrote on X. “I refused. We didn’t block protesters in Russia, Belarus, or Iran. We won’t start doing it in Europe.”
The tech mogul said Mr. Lerner aimed to interfere in Romania’s election, silencing critics so the “pro-European” candidate would win. Mr. Durov had previously been held against his will at an airport in Paris for the crime of allowing people to speak their minds. He was freed after paying $5.6 million.
Lack of respect for fundamental Western values isn’t unique to Europe. That’s why the State Department is ensuring that students who come to America on visas don’t use it to destroy our way of life.
“No one’s entitled to a student visa,” Mr. Rubio said in a recent congressional hearing. “We will revoke the visa of anyone who’s in this country as a guest who’s here to stir trouble. I’m looking to get crazy people out of this country.”
Outsiders who seek to meddle in our politics and erase our constitutional rights shouldn’t be rewarded with our hospitality. Hopefully, the administration’s pressure tactics will rekindle the respect these rights deserve.
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