Threats Facing Conservative Speech

Floor Speech

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Mr. MEUSER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague and friend, Mr. Buck, for his leadership on this issue. This is quite a somewhat disturbing issue, I think, to all of us, Republicans and Democrats.

For the last 2 years, Americans have often been led to believe that anything they see and hear that does not comport with the stance of the Biden administration is somehow ``misinformation,'' whether it is criticism of COVID mandates, the fact that our border is not secure, or the authenticity of Hunter Biden's laptop.

Thanks to the Twitter files, we know that social media companies actively exploited their ideology and suppressed speech with which they disagreed. Nice, in America.

Two years ago, two of our Democrat colleagues sent letters to every cable and satellite provider calling conservative news channels FOX News, Newsmax, and One America News purveyors of disinformation and asked specifically: ``Are you planning to carry FOX News, Newsmax, both now and beyond any contract renewal date? If so, why?''

Last year, DIRECTV announced that it was deplatforming One America News and just last week they deplatformed Newsmax.

Over a million DIRECTV subscribers in Pennsylvania, hundreds of thousands in my district, no longer have access to Newsmax through their TV. Dozens and dozens of my constituents have written or called my office to voice their concern and anger about DIRECTV's actions to deplatform Newsmax. This is unacceptable.

The Committee on Oversight and Accountability will be, I very much hope and will be supporting, investigating private companies that have circumvented the First Amendment for ideological purposes, and this investigation should not be limited to social media platforms alone.

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