America is not the only place where free speech rights have been under attack for the past few years.
Hundreds of people have been charged for spreading “fake news” and memes in the United Kingdom.
But J.D. Vance torched the British Prime Minister to his face with a reality check that left him speechless.
Democrats and Big Tech engaged in a massive censorship campaign against so-called “misinformation” that trampled the American people’s First Amendment rights.
Government officials worked with universities, nonprofits, and Big Tech to censor speech online.
At the urging of the Biden administration, Big Tech banned Donald Trump and many of his supporters, suppressed criticism of COVID mandates, and kicked folks off their platforms who refused to go along with the Left’s woke gender ideology.
Donald Trump went to work dismantling the Left’s censorship regime on Day One.
He signed an executive order titled “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship.”
“Over the last 4 years, the previous administration trampled free speech rights by censoring Americans’ speech on online platforms, often by exerting substantial coercive pressure on third parties, such as social media companies, to moderate, deplatform, or otherwise suppress speech that the Federal Government did not approve,” the order read. “Under the guise of combatting ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ and ‘malinformation,’ the Federal Government infringed on the constitutionally protected speech rights of American citizens across the United States in a manner that advanced the Government’s preferred narrative about significant matters of public debate,” the order continued. “Government censorship of speech is intolerable in a free society.”
But America is not the only place where free speech has been under attack.
“Almost 300 people have been charged with spreading illegal ‘fake news’ or sending ‘threatening communications’ since the Online Safety Act came into force in 2023,” the Telegraph recently reported. “Dozens have received convictions under the act.”
These people were arrested under the Online Safety Act, which requires technology companies to engage in censorship or face billions of pounds in fines.
The law banned “disinformation” that could cause “non-trivial psychological or physical harm.”
On February 14, J.D. Vance took the gloves off on British leaders for censoring speech in a talk he gave at the Munich Security Conference.
Vance ripped the EU for locking people up over so-called “hateful content.”
“In Britain and across Europe free speech, I fear, is in retreat,” Vance said. “Most concerningly, I look to our very dear friends the United Kingdom, where the backslide away from conscience rights has placed the basic liberties of religious Britons, in particular, in the crosshairs.”
Vance’s comments set off a firestorm in Europe.
But British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had a chance to see J.D. Vance face-to-face on Thursday when he visited the White House for meetings with President Trump.
J.D. Vance did not retreat or back down from his words.
“I said what I said,” Vance told Starmer to his face. “There have been infringements on Free Speech that actually affect not just the British people, but also American technology companies, and, by extension, American citizens.”
‼️@VP tells @DailySignal the Trump admin and PM Keir Starmer are discussing UK’s free speech violations.
…”There have been infringements on free speech that actually affect not just the British…but also affect American technology companies, and, by extension, American… pic.twitter.com/WTIC7Z4wQu
— Elizabeth Troutman Mitchell (@TheElizMitchell) February 27, 2025
Starmer attempted to defend himself by gaslighting Vance.
“We’ve had free speech for a very, very long time in the United Kingdom, and it will last for a very, very long time,” he said. “In relation to free speech in the U.K., I’m very proud of our history there.”
Of course, Starmer defends free speech in Britain as much as Joe Biden did in America.
But Donald Trump is taking a sledgehammer to the global censorship regime and restoring free speech.
Related posts:
How DOGE struck a Deep State nerve by shuttering USAID
Josh Hawley committed one terrible betrayal that left conservatives seeing red
