JD Vance Warns UK Not To Go Down ‘Dark Path’ Of Censorship That Occurred Under Biden

Vice President J.D. Vance warned the United Kingdom on Friday to avoid going down the same “dark path” of censorship that he said occurred in several western democracies during former President Joe Biden’s administration.

Vance, who has voiced concerns over Europe’s free speech laws, said during a press conference that the western world became “too comfortable” with censoring speech rather than “engaging in a diverse array of opinions.” The vice president has criticized the U.K. in particular for intentionally censoring its citizens’ speech, particularly on social media.

“I’ve raised concerns about free speech in the United States of America. I think the entire collective West, the TransAtlantic relationship, our NATO allies, certainly the United States under the Biden administration, got a little too comfortable with censoring rather than engaging with a diverse array of opinions. So that’s been my view,” Vance said alongside David Lammy, the U.K. secretary of state for foreign commonwealth and development affairs. “Obviously, I’ve raised some criticism because of concerns about our friends on this side of the Atlantic.”

“But the thing that I’d say to the people of England or anybody else, to David , is many of the things that I worry most about were happening in the United States from 2020 to 2024. I just don’t want other countries to follow us down what I think was a very dark path under the Biden administration,” Vance continued.

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The vice president told European leaders at the Munich Security Conference on Feb. 14 that they had abandoned “some of their most fundamental values” by replacing free speech expression and religious liberties with censorship. He specifically chastised the U.K. over the arrest of Adam Smith-Connor, a military veteran and father, who got arrested and later convicted