By Simon Lewis
WASHINGTON, Feb 9 (Reuters) – The Trump administration will fund efforts to promote free speech within Western countries allied with Washington, a senior State Department official said on Monday during a visit to Europe focused on pushing back against European regulations that U.S. officials have branded censorship.
U.S. officials have forcefully opposed online rules like the EU’s Digital Services Act and Britain’s Online Safety Act, which Washington says stifle free speech, and in particular criticism of immigration policies, while imposing burdensome requirements on U.S. tech companies. Advocates argue these rules combat hateful speech, misinformation and disinformation online.
Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers, who has emerged as a lead figure in this push, will discuss freedom of speech and digital freedom with officials and others on her trip to Dublin, Budapest, Warsaw, and Munich, the State Department said.
“One way my office is going to operate differently is we’re going to be very forthright and transparent about everything we do,” Rogers said during a panel discussion in Budapest on Monday, emphasizing that her role carries the power to direct U.S. funding through grants. “I want to promote free speech in Western allied democracies, and… that’s what my grant making is going to be doing.”
A Financial Times report last week cited sources with knowledge of the matter saying that Rogers had discussed with members of the UK opposition party Reform about a plan to fund think tanks and charities aligned with President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” policies. Asked about the report, a State Department spokesperson did not confirm specific funding, but called the plan “a transparent, lawful use of resources to advance U.S. interests and values abroad.”
‘PROSCRIBED’ VIEWPOINTS
The administration’s National Security Strategy in December said European leaders were censoring free speech and suppressing opposition to immigration policies that it said risk “civilisational erasure” for the continent.
The U.S. then issued visa bans against a former European Union commissioner and four anti-disinformation campaigners Washington said were involved in censoring U.S. social media platforms. European leaders condemned the bans, and defended Europe’s right to legislate on how foreign companies operate locally.
U.S. officials have also engaged with far-right parties in Europe they see as targeted by online rules, arguing legitimate anti-immigration views are censored in the name of preventing hate speech.
Rogers, who appeared on Monday alongside a top aide to nationalist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, said the Trump administration was not at odds with a majority of people in Europe on issues like migration, citing polls in European countries that she did not specify.
“The United States government, via me, but not only me, has been engaging aggressively on the issue of free speech, because you don’t have self governance without freedom of speech, you can’t have a democratic deliberation if viewpoints are proscribed from the public square,” Rogers said.
(Reporting by Simon Lewis, editing by Deepa Babington)
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