David Inserra
Last month, Vice President JD Vance gave a speech at the Munich Security Conference that caused quite a stir.
The US and Europe share strong military alliances and deep economic bonds, Vance argued, but he then asked, “what exactly” are these arrangements “defending?” Rather than threats from abroad, Vance stated, “What I worry about is the threat from within—the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values.”
Vance rightly criticized the European approach to free expression, citing numerous acts of censorship across Europe. He cited the UK jailing its citizens for praying silently near an abortion center and threatening to arrest those who pray within their own homes. He noted Sweden’s effective endorsement of blasphemy laws against those who peacefully burn Qurans—even as extremists or foreign governments murder these activists. He also pointed to German police crackdowns on offensive online speech.
Since that speech was given, the UK has begun consideration of a new legal definition of Islamophobia that will likely amount to a blasphemy law and secretly demanding Apple break its encryption, threatening users’ security and expression around the world.
Rather than protect democracy, Vance argued, censorship “is the most surefire way to destroy democracy.”
European leaders were quick to condemn Vance’s speech. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz responded, “We should be very clear that free speech in Europe means that you are not attacking others in ways that are against legislation and laws we have in our country.” In other words, Scholz’s response to Vance’s critique of European backsliding on speech was to affirm that free expression is not guaranteed in Europe.
But it’s not just foreign leaders defending Europe’s limited approach to speech. CBS anchor Margaret Brennan claimed that the Nazis weaponized free speech to bring about the Holocaust. This was rejected by Secretary of State MarcoRubio, who corrected Brennan by pointing out that Nazi Germany was a totalitarian state with no freedom of speech.
Other free expression experts challenged Brennan’s invocation of the Weimar Fallacy—the false belief that the Nazis only rose to power because too much speech was allowed in the Weimar Republic. But history shows the opposite—German officials constantly censored Nazi leaders and newspapers, including Adolf Hitler and Der Sturmer. But censorship did not stop the rise of the Nazis, and the Nazis even used it to make themselves martyrs and propagandize their persecution at the hands of the government. And, of course, once they seized power, the Nazis turned the instruments of censorship against anyone who might resist.
As if to prove Vance correct, CBS’s 60 Minutes dedicated a segment of its program to highlighting modern-day Germany’s investigation and prosecution of thousands of its citizens for hateful, insulting, or misleading speech. The CBS crew filmed early morning raids by armed police officers at the homes of Germans who spread non-violent but offensive speech online. German prosecutors giddily discussed seizing computers and phones, imposing large fines, and jailing Germans whose internet posts are deemed illegal.
CBS framed the story as Germany’s attempt to restore civility, keep people safe, and protect democracy while largely eschewing the detrimental impacts on free expression. CBS warmly interviewed a German politician calling for the suppression of speech attacking her and other politicians that is harmful, offensive, or misleading. The piece uncritically cited the EU’s Digital Services Act as cracking down on harmful content across the EU, even as EU officials use it to threaten and punish social media companies for allowing speech the EU doesn’t like. While the CBS journalist gently pushed back on one anti-hate speech advocacy organization, the segment came across as a general endorsement of German censorship.
Of course, CBS and its journalists are free to argue that free expression is dangerous and that the US should embrace a less free and more European view of expression. It’s just a bit ironic and frankly sad to see an American journalistic institution welcome censorship when history shows that journalists are among the greatest targets of censorship.
But, even more ironically, CBS is defending government policing of speech at the same time that President Trump is targeting them for their speech. President Trump and his appointees at the Federal Communication Commission are investigating CBS for “news distortion” in their editing of Kamala Harris’s 60 Minutes interview before the 2024 election.
And so even as JD Vance rightly notes the dangerous spread of censorship in Europe, Trump and his administration, just like the Biden administration, are targeting speech they do not like. While the First Amendment protects us from the worst attacks on free expression, the impulse to censor is universal and must be resisted universally.
Our political leaders, journalists, thinkers, and average citizens should reject the growing speech restrictions being modeled across Europe and strive for a culture that maximizes free expression for all.
