On Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Ingraham Angle,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) reacted to reporting from The Intercept on federal agencies working with tech platforms to suppress online speech by stating that, for all the Biden administration’s talk about democracy, “they’re undermining the very basic principles of our constitutional republic” by censoring speech.
Paul said, “You know, for all the talk of democracy, it seems to me that they’re undermining the very basic principles of our constitutional republic. Freedom of speech was listed in the First Amendment because it was one of the most important rights that our founders thought should be protected. But having the government collude with big tech to censor speech is something that goes against every grain of everything that anyone has ever spoken about as far as freedom of speech.”
He continued, “So, when we get back in session, I’m going to introduce legislation that will forbid the government from colluding with private companies to censor speech. Now, this is a tricky situation because many people believe that the First Amendment doesn’t allow us to regulate the speech of private companies, but without question, we can regulate the government and we can prevent and forbid the government from colluding with private tech on speech. But I think we should also preclude them and prohibit them from gathering up our data.”
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