Donald Trump’s pick to lead the National Institutes of Health called out the Biden administration for silencing free speech.
Replying to Sen. Ashley Moody (R-FL) during his confirmation hearing Wednesday, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya spoke to the importance of free speech and dissent in the scientific community. Dr. Bhattacharya reflected on how speech was silenced under the previous administration concerning COVID-19: “The root problem was that people who had alternative ideas were suppressed. I personally was subject to censorship by the actions of the Biden administration during the pandemic.”
The Twitter Files revealed how Twitter effectively shadowbanned Bhattacharya, placing his account on a “Trends Blacklist.” This was likely due to his pinned tweet of the Great Barrington Declaration, which criticized the government’s COVID-19 response, as recorded in MRC’s unique CensorTrack database. But Bhattacharya also says the Biden administration was involved in pressuring Big Tech, as the Murthy v. Missouri lawsuit showed.
Censorship of speech hampered scientific inquiry, Bhattacharya emphasized. “Science, to succeed, needs free speech,” he stated. “It needs an environment where there’s tolerance for dissent.”
In an interview with MRC VP Dan Schneider on MRC UnCensored August 2024, Bhattacharya compared the censorship cartel to the Cold War-era Iron Curtain. Citing a “silicon curtain” between free speech and censorship, Bhattacharya said, “The basic civil right of free speech has been essentially, by design, curtailed.”
The doctor went even further in his criticism of censorship, even calling it “un-American.”
“It's so fundamentally un-American to censor speech,” he said. He emphasized the importance of U.S. leadership in deterring other nations from censorship. “It's very difficult for a country to impose restrictions on speech … if the United States doesn't cooperate.”
