America First Legal has instigated a lawsuit against the US Department of State, alleging clandestine activities surrounding the Biden administration’s purported outsourcing of censorship through the Global Engagement Center (GEC).
We obtained a copy of the complaint for you here.
This legal action is rooted in a series of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests that AFL submitted on December 6, 2022. These requests aimed to expose the details behind GEC’s grant allocations and funding opportunities—mechanisms that AFL argues are employed to enable the outsourcing of the Biden administration’s propaganda and censorship efforts to leftist nonprofit groups.
Specific grants awarded to organizations such as The Atlantic Council, National Endowment for Democracy, Moonshot CVE, and Digital Public Square were targeted in the AFL’s requests.
Furthermore, the AFL expressed interest in funding allocated for a “New Counter-Disinformation Game” and NATO. Despite these legitimate requests, the Department of State has allegedly refrained from delivering the requested information.
AFL contends that the Biden administration has transformed the GEC into a conduit for funneling taxpayer money to a purported leftist “Censorship-Industrial Complex.”
The GEC is accused of utilizing these funds to manufacture projects such as “Cat Park,” a video game designed to shield young people from “disinformation.”
Through a separate lawsuit, AFL has unveiled evidence of the GEC’s involvement in propagating state propaganda via private media organizations. These actions include releasing a confidential list of journalists who were allegedly disseminating propaganda on behalf of the government. Additionally, AFL cites reports that the National Endowment for Democracy used GEC grants to support the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), an initiative reportedly designed to blacklist and defund conservative media. AFL speculates that the Department of State could be concealing records to prevent full public disclosure of its operations.
AFL has previously launched significant federal lawsuits against entities accused of colluding with the federal government to suppress speech. The targeted entities included Stanford Internet Observatory, University of Washington, Graphika, and the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Lab.
In a major victory on July 4, 2023, AFL was instrumental in helping the Missouri and Louisiana Attorneys General secure a federal court injunction. This ruling prevented the US Department of State and specific GEC employees from conspiring with social media companies to promote censorship.
Consequently, a planned meeting to discuss the 2024 election preparations with Facebook officials was abruptly called off. The current lawsuit against the Department of State signifies another critical chapter in AFL’s ongoing efforts to protect constitutional rights.
AFL Vice President and General Counsel, Gene Hamilton, made a strong statement concerning the case. He posits that the Biden Administration has initiated an unprecedented attack on the First Amendment, using misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation as an excuse.
“Citing ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ and ‘malinformation’ as a pretext, the Biden Administration has launched an unprecedented assault against the First Amendment. But AFL, courageous state Attorneys General, and other freedom-loving Americans are pushing back and winning. The records in this case will shed critical light on the Administration’s activities and reveal, for all to see, the parasitic relationship between the leftist nonprofit class and government overreach; the public’s right to know will be vindicated,” Hamilton said.
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