Trump takes aim at social media ‘censorship’ with executive order

Within the first hours of his second term, President Donald Trump turned his attention to social media with executive order focused on what he described as “government censorship.”

The executive order states that no federal department or official may use government resources to limit the free speech of US citizens.

Notably, it also backfired, directing the attorney general and federal agency heads to investigate conduct that occurred during the four years of the Biden administration, which ended Monday. It alleged that the government had violated citizens’ freedom of speech “under the guise of fighting ‘disinformation’, ‘misinformation’ and ‘misinformation’.”

The Biden administration, the order said, has exerted “substantial coercive pressure on third parties, such as social media companies, to moderate, deplatform or otherwise suppress speech that the federal government has not approved.”

In July, The US Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Biden administration in a case that allegedly overstepped its bounds in its dealings with social media companies.

Concerns about misinformation and misinformation online increased during the 2016 election season. and again during the COVID pandemic that began in 2020, as well as this year’s election cycle, related to topics including voting processes, foreign interference in US affairs, hate speech, and vaccinations. Social media companies implement a number of policies in an attempt to ram posts which potentially endangers public safety and public health.

Trump himself was stopped for a period of social media sites including Twitter (now X) and Facebook after the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.

The new order does not address the issue of misinformation and misinformation that can cause real-world harm or the potential risks they pose to the country. It also remains unclear how the order might affect US agencies tasked with monitoring online activity for potential threats to the upcoming election.

Tech executives are increasingly coming to terms with claims of government overreach and pressure to moderate content on their platforms. Earlier this month, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced opting out of the third-party fact-checking program on Instagram and Facebook, replacing it with a user-driven moderation system called X-like Community Notes.