The Democrats’ star witness at a hearing on free speech and the Constitution defended what she argued was the government’s right to push for censorship, leaving GOP Sens. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) and Mike Lee (R-UT) disturbed.
The first hearing of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution on Tuesday invited journalists and constitutional scholars to speak on threats to the First Amendment. One such scholar, invited by the Democrat minority on the committee, was George Washington University Law professor and MSNBC guest Mary Anne Franks, who called the idea of a “Censorship Industrial Complex” a “myth” and “ludicrous.” She also argued in favor of the government’s efforts to fund non-governmental organizations that go on to censor Americans. “The government also has its own rights of free speech, including the right to prefer certain viewpoints,” she argued. “It’s allowed to communicate those preferences through persuasion, encouragement and even funding.” GOP lawmakers found her argument to be unconvincing, or to use her word, “ludicrous.”
After denying that Big Tech silencing users is censorship, the author of "The Cult of the Constitution" and "Fearless Speech, Breaking Free from the First Amendment," complains that the "myth of the censorship industrial complex" has been used to "vilify" her fellow censorship… pic.twitter.com/P0gLoOZqIo
— Tom Olohan (@tolohan) March 25, 2025
Sen. Lee found it particularly troubling. “I don’t buy that argument at all,” Lee said in exclusive comments to MRC. “You’re taking the hard-earned money of the American people [and] using it to deprive them of information to which they should be entitled as citizens in a free republic.”
During the hearing, both Franks and ranking member Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT) argued that the actions of government-funded third-party censorship outfits like NewsGuard, the Global Disinformation Index and others are not government actors, but Lee vigorously disagreed. “Particularly with something like free speech, I don't know that it's fair to say, ‘Well, it’s funded through a third-party entity,’ if that entity itself is funded by the government,” he said. “That ends up being a type of agent of the government, and I think that needs to be taken into account.”
The subcommittee chairman Sen. Schmitt took a similar stance in response to Frank's accusation that the “Censorship Industrial Complex” is a “myth.” After the hearing, Schmitt told reporters, “Part of the reason we are tying it to the NGO’s is because this web still exists. This network of NGO’s funded by the government to suppress American speech still exists.”
He noted that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has already begun to expose NGO funding, but there is still much work to be done. “We want to make sure we root those dollars out, that they don’t continue to benefit, that they don’t continue to do things that are illegal,” he said. He then added, “The government again cannot outsource this sort of illegal activity to non-profits or universities or Big Tech companies.”
Schmitt also called out his Democratic colleagues for their disquieting choice of Franks to testify in the first place. “It’s telling that that was the Democrats’ star witness, somebody who actually believes that we should take away somebody’s right to speak their mind,” said Schmitt.
At today's censorship hearing, Democrats invited a witness that believes that the First Amendment is essentially a white male fetish.
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) March 25, 2025
You can't make this stuff up. pic.twitter.com/cLzaSqsen4
During the hearing, the chairman made a point to expose Franks’ book and other writings on the First Amendment. He said, “You've written, and I quote, ‘The conception of free speech enshrined in the First Amendment reflects white wealthy men's experiences and interests.’ You've described free speech advocacy as a ‘neo-Confederate agenda.’” Schmitt also referred to a Boston Globe thought experiment in which Franks participated, where writers argued for how they would change the Constitution. Franks, unsurprisingly, given her leftist bonafides, proposed changes to the First and Second Amendments.
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