Free speech advocate and legal expert Jonathan Turley laid out how America and the European Union are in a power struggle over the fate of free speech.
Turley, in a Sunday appearance on Fox and Friends Weekend, lauded American officials for their work to protect free speech, but cautioned that European Union (EU) officials are looking to implement global censorship. This is an existential fight for the United States," Turley emphasized. He highlighted that the EU has gradually bulldozed the national identities of European countries and is already trying to do the same thing to the U.S. with its attempts to force American tech companies to censor users.
"The EU is an incrementalist institution,” Turley explained. They always understood that people would cling to their national identity but many people in the EU view nationalism as a dangerous relic," hence the EU has revoked rights little by little, affecting nations even outside the union, including the U.S.
Turley lauded the Trump-Vance administration for being "the first administration that is finally joining this fight and saying that they are not going to be passive as the EU establishes standards for free speech for Americans and American companies."
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The main concern for Americans is that "the EU is exporting the standards," Turley noted, referencing his upcoming book "Rage of the Republic." EU officials claim they "can censor Americans," and anti-free speech U.S. figures have gone to Europe to ask for just that, Turley added. He referred to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton going to Europe after Elon Musk bought X and urging the EU to bolster global censorship.
The law professor warned that American carriers could end up censoring free speech on topics that the EU says are "hate speech" or otherwise illegal if the EU puts on enough pressure, as it did with the new $140 million fine on X. "What the EU is telling X [and] Facebook is that we will hit you with billion-dollar fines until you restore the censorship that existed in previous [U.S.] administrations," Turley added.
The Trump administration has consistently prioritized protecting free speech and the latest example is Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s sanctions on five European officials who contributed to the international censorship complex.
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One of the five sanctioned censors is former EU Commissioner Thierry Breton was "one of the key figures in creating this EU censorship system," Turley explained. He later added, "This guy Breton threatened Musk when Musk announced he was going to interview Trump when he was running for the presidency. He threatened him and said ‘The EU is monitoring you and we may sanction you depending on what happens in that interview.’"
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