Republican Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas released a letter Tuesday pressing the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to clarify whether or not it will continue the “breathtaking” political censorship practices that took place during the 2020 election.
Marshall, as well as Republican Senators Eric Schmitt of Missouri and Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, asked CISA Director Jen Easterly to overturn information regarding the agency’s handling of Americans’ speech in order to “avoid past mistakes that put the agency in direct conflict with the First Amendment,” according to the letter obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. CISA worked alongside the Election Integrity Partnership (EIP) to “strong arm” social media platforms into censoring political speech during the 2020 election.
“CISA has previously been caught pressuring social media and internet platforms to censor content, blatantly violating the First Amendment,” Marshall told the DCNF. “Any effort by the Harris-Biden administration to silence facts and opinions about their failed agenda is not only an abuse of power—it’s illegal. As we enter the final stretch of the 2024 presidential campaign, we are fighting to ensure there are no attempts by the federal government to censor and strong-arm online platforms.”
During the 2020 election, CISA also engaged in flagging “disinformation” on social media platforms in a process known as switchboarding, according to a House Judiciary Committee report from June 2023. CISA also created “portals” to report “misinformation” in order to “circumvent the First Amendment’s prohibition against government-induced censorship.”
The committee also released emails in November detailing communications between CISA officials directing the censorship of certain content. CISA had full “visibility” of the content that was being flagged to the EIP as “misinformation,” although it did not directly report content.
“The First Amendment prohibits the government from ‘abridging freedom of speech’ and the Supreme Court has recognized that for ‘core political speech’ ‘the importance of First Amendment protections is at its zenith,’” the letter reads. “In today’s world, ‘core political speech’ is often found on social media platforms. Instead of respecting these long-standing norms, CISA has in the past worked with partners to violate them, thus undermining trust in the agency for many Americans.”
“This is why we are writing to discourage CISA from prescribing what is favored and disfavored speech going forward,” the letter continued. “Millions of Americans expect nothing less from their government.”
Marshall and his colleagues asked Easterly to confirm that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and CISA have no intention to continue the “switchboarding” and censorship practices it previously engaged in, according to the letter. The GOP Senators also asked the agency to confirm that they are no longer in contact with social media platforms, universities or for-profit entities in regards to content moderation.
“If we are to restore and maintain trust in our elections for all Americans, the time to act is now,” the letter reads.
CISA declined to respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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