Thread by @MikeBenzCyber on Thread Reader App
🚨 The House is voting this week on the new National Security / State Dept funding bill (H.R. 8595), which includes for the first time in US history a blanket ban on any NGOs or contractors using any funds for social media censorship activity. Here’s what’s new 🧵🧵🧵: 
2. The language in this bill contains the most sweeping and comprehensive counter-censorship restrictions ever put upon recipients of US government grants or contracts. No pressuring platforms, no pressuring online advertisers, no working with foreign governments. 
3. No NGO or contractor getting a penny of the appropriations can go anywhere near matters relating to “disinformation,” “misinformation,” “hate speech,” “brand safety,” or related censorship vectors. 
4. No NGO, contractor or subcontractor can support or help a foreign gov’t wield censorship laws like the EU Digital Services Act or UK Online Safety Act or Brazil’s TSE censorship court edicts against social media activity on American platforms like X, Meta & Google/YouTube. 
5. On top of the bill’s hard bans on all censorship-adjacent activity, all government agencies issuing grants to NGOs & contractors now have an affirmative reporting requirement to proactively describe to Congress steps to ensure compliance with these anti-censorship provisions. 
6. This bill places hard handcuffs on institutions like the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) & The Asia Foundation, who in recent years merged their democracy promotion work with new “counter-disinformation” activity aimed at influencing content moderation on social media. 
7. Credit goes to Chairman Mario DĂaz-Balart (@MarioDB) who fought to get all this included in the final House bill. I’m honored to have helped consult on what I hope will become a new gold standard for Congressional funding to ensure a permanent defense of free speech online.
2. The language in this bill contains the most sweeping and comprehensive counter-censorship restrictions ever put upon recipients of US government grants or contracts. No pressuring platforms, no pressuring online advertisers, no working with foreign governments.
3. No NGO or contractor getting a penny of the appropriations can go anywhere near matters relating to “disinformation,” “misinformation,” “hate speech,” “brand safety,” or related censorship vectors.
4. No NGO, contractor or subcontractor can support or help a foreign gov’t wield censorship laws like the EU Digital Services Act or UK Online Safety Act or Brazil’s TSE censorship court edicts against social media activity on American platforms like X, Meta & Google/YouTube.
5. On top of the bill’s hard bans on all censorship-adjacent activity, all government agencies issuing grants to NGOs & contractors now have an affirmative reporting requirement to proactively describe to Congress steps to ensure compliance with these anti-censorship provisions.
6. This bill places hard handcuffs on institutions like the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) & The Asia Foundation, who in recent years merged their democracy promotion work with new “counter-disinformation” activity aimed at influencing content moderation on social media.
7. Credit goes to Chairman Mario DĂaz-Balart (@MarioDB) who fought to get all this included in the final House bill. I’m honored to have helped consult on what I hope will become a new gold standard for Congressional funding to ensure a permanent defense of free speech online.