Foreign countries think they can quietly subvert Americans' right to free speech.
That doesn't fly under the Trump administration.
And Marco Rubio came out swinging against this scary globalist censorship scheme.
The EU's Decade-Long Campaign to Censor American Free Speech
This isn't new. The European Commission started pressuring American tech platforms to censor content more aggressively as far back as 2015.
They held over 100 closed-door meetings with social media giants like Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube – pushing them to tighten their global content rules.
Global. Meaning your feed. Your posts. Your speech.
The House Judiciary Committee got the receipts.
Internal documents obtained under subpoena proved that platforms changed their worldwide content moderation policies in response to EU pressure – including censorship of true information about COVID-19 vaccines, immigration, and border security.
The EU even labeled the phrase "we need to take back our country" as illegal hate speech requiring removal.
That's not a fringe case. That's how European bureaucrats see your political opinions.
How Rubio's State Department Is Fighting the Digital Services Act
Secretary of State Marco Rubio signed a State Department cable making the administration's position crystal clear.
Foreign laws restricting how American tech companies handle data would "disrupt global data flows, increase costs and cybersecurity risks, limit AI and cloud services, and expand government control in ways that can undermine civil liberties and enable censorship."
He called out the EU's General Data Protection Regulation specifically – branding it exactly what it is: an "unnecessarily burdensome" scheme targeting American companies.
Rubio didn't stop at Europe. The cable directly accused China of bundling technology infrastructure projects with restrictive data rules to expand Beijing's global surveillance reach.
American diplomats worldwide now have orders to actively counter these schemes and champion the free flow of data across borders.
EU Fines on American Tech Companies Are Hitting Your Wallet
In 2024, the EU collected €3.8 billion in fines from American tech companies – more than all European public tech firms paid in income taxes combined.
Trump called it exactly what it is on Truth Social – "very unfair for American tech companies and the U.S. as a whole."
Those fines don't disappear into a corporate ledger.
Companies pass costs on. When Brussels hits Amazon or Apple with nine-figure penalties, it shows up in your Prime membership, your App Store, and your checkout total.
Every American with an account is quietly subsidizing the EU's censorship machine.
Meanwhile, Chinese tech companies operating across Europe face almost none of the same scrutiny. EU regulators have spent years pounding American firms while giving Alibaba, Tencent, and Baidu a pass.
Democrats Are Getting Exactly What They Want
Nobody in the mainstream media will say this out loud.
Democrats love this arrangement.
They couldn't get away with federally mandating that Facebook censor vaccine skeptics or silence debate on illegal immigration. The First Amendment makes that a political grenade. So Brussels does it for them.
The EU pressures platforms to change their global content rules.
Platforms comply to avoid nine-figure fines. Conservative voices on immigration, COVID vaccines, and election integrity disappear from American feeds – with no Democrat fingerprints anywhere on the decision.
Outsourced censorship. Clean hands, dirty work.
Rubio Launches freedom.gov to Break Through Foreign Censorship
This cable isn't Rubio's first punch. In December 2025, he announced the State Department would bar leading figures of the global censorship-industrial complex from entering the United States.
He shut down the State Department's Global Engagement Center in April 2025 – an agency that spent millions silencing American voices while pretending to fight foreign disinformation.
Now the administration is launching freedom.gov – a portal to help people worldwide access content that foreign governments have banned.
The message on that site says it plainly: "Information is power. Reclaim your human right to free expression."
That's Trump drawing a line. Foreign regulators want to control what you read, what you post, and what you think.
Rubio is telling them no – and backing it up with diplomatic pressure, visa bans, and a direct counter-strategy.
The EU built the machine. Democrats cheered from the sidelines. The Trump administration just declared war on both of them.
Sources:
- Jack Cowhick, "Marco Rubio Reportedly Targets Potential Censorship Schemes Worldwide," The Daily Caller, February 25, 2026.
- House Judiciary Committee Republicans, "New Report Exposes European Commission Decade-Long Campaign to Censor American Speech," February 3, 2026.
- House Judiciary Committee Republicans, "The Foreign Censorship Threat: How the European Union's Digital Services Act Compels Global Censorship and Infringes on American Free Speech," July 25, 2025.
- Americans for Tax Reform, "Brussels Exploits American Tech Companies by Enforcing Heavy Fines for Regulatory Non-Compliance," January 16, 2026.
- Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, "Defending American Tech in Global Markets," December 4, 2025.
