Free Republic

Officials from the National Science Foundation tried to conceal the spending of millions of taxpayer dollars on research and development for artificial intelligence tools used to censor political speech and influence the outcome of elections, according to a new congressional report. The report looking into the National Science Foundation (NSF) is the latest addition to a growing body of evidence that critics claim shows federal officials—especially at the FBI and the CIA—are creating a “censorship-industrial complex” to monitor American public expression and suppress speech disfavored by the government. “In the name of combatting alleged misinformation regarding COVID-19 and the 2020...

There’s a movement brewing to shut down conservative websites that offer views and information contradicting left-wing orthodoxy. Investigative reporter Gabe Kaminsky did an excellent job of uncovering how activist organizations, some partnered with the State Department, work to blacklist and defund conservative media. His ongoing series at the Washington Examiner is worth reading and explains how this is part of a larger effort to effectively shut down conservative media publications. It’s predictable—yet nevertheless disturbing—stuff. “Major ad companies are increasingly seeking guidance from purportedly ‘nonpartisan’ groups claiming to be detecting and fighting online ‘disinformation.’” Kaminsky wrote. “These same ‘disinformation’ monitors are...

This is the first part of a...series about self-styled 'disinformation' tracking organizations that are cracking down on conservative media and part of a lucrative operation that aims to defund disfavored speech. Well-funded "disinformation" tracking groups are part of a stealth operation blacklisting and trying to defund conservative media, likely costing the news companies large sums in advertising dollars, a Washington Examiner investigation found. Major ad companies are increasingly seeking guidance from purportedly "nonpartisan" groups claiming to be detecting and fighting online "disinformation." These same "disinformation" monitors are compiling secret website blacklists and feeding them to ad companies, with the aim...

On Friday the Biden administration has rolled out with a new human rights-related blacklist of companies from China, Russia and Iran - including over twenty Chinese entities targeted over abuses and high-tech surveillance in Xinjiang province, adding to the prior June list. Over 30 international companies total are said to be newly blacklisted in the move.Included among them are Shenzhen Cobber Information Technology, the Beijing-based academic institution China Academy of Electronics and Information Technology, and Leon technology, among others. China Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin vowed "all necessary steps" in retaliation to "protect the rights and interests of its companies"...

Gina Carano is “not currently employed by Lucasfilm,” the company said in a statement Wednesday after controversy erupted over “The Mandalorian” star’s social media posts. “Gina Carano is not currently employed by Lucasfilm and there are no plans for her to be in the future,” a Lucasfilm spokesperson said in a statement. “Nevertheless, her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable.” Carano shared several offensive posts on her Instagram stories Tuesday night, including one that likened contemporary political differences to the treatment of Jews in Nazi Germany. “Jews were beaten in...

China's Communist Party uses the Great Firewall to block information from its citizens. Blocking speech based on politics has been a hallmark of every totalitarian government“That is all right. I had them on my list, too,” a prominent public figure joked after learning that he had been blacklisted by a political opponent. Who said this? Was it Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., after Simon and Schuster canceled his book deal because he challenged the Electoral College results from Pennsylvania, even though Democrats had similarly objected in 2001, 2005, and 2017? Was it a Trump administration official responding to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s...

MyPillow is facing further pressure from retailers after CEO Mike Lindell's continued support of conspiracy theories regarding election fraud -- but some store chains are claiming it's due to lagging demand. On Tuesday, the Macy's website listed MyPillow products as 'currently unavailable', one day after Lindell said he'd been dropped by Bed Bath & Beyond, Kohl's and Wayfair.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Thursday named addressing the censorship of conservatives and conservative viewpoints as a top legislative issue to “get right” moving forward. DeSantis, an ally of President Trump, spoke at the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Policy Orientation in Austin, Texas, on Thursday and said that the country must “really think deeply about if we are a disfavored class based on our principles, based on having conservative views, based on being a Christian, based on whatever you can say that is not favored in Silicon Valley.”

Forbes ⁩chief content officer Randall Lane warned companies this week against hiring ⁦Kayleigh McEnany and other prominent Trump officials. Lane writes, “Hire any of Trump’s fellow fabulists above, and Forbes will assume that everything your company or firm talks about is a lie.”

There is an organized and growing effort to push back against the cancel culture on college campuses. Thousands of conservative and libertarian scholars and academics are standing up and issuing a ringing endorsement of academic freedom. It’s called “The Philadelphia Statement on Civil Discourse and the Strengthening of Liberal Democracy” and has been signed by such luminaries as Robert George, Christina Hoff Sommers, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and more. The statement embodies concepts that all can embrace — at least, those whose minds haven’t been poisoned by the radical left. Tragically, we are losing these defining features of our democracy. Common...

The U.S. on Wednesday announced it blacklisted Chinese officials and business executives involved in the military buildup of the disputed South China Sea, further ratcheting up tensions in the region ahead of the November election -- the same day that Beijing reportedly fired missiles including an "aircraft-carrier killer" into the sea as a "warning" to the U.S. China had claimed a U-2 spy plane entered a no-fly zone without permission during a naval drill in the Bohai Sea, a military source told the South China Morning Post. The Pentagon has given few details, but said a U-2 flew "within the...

In 2016, I was in the greenroom for a Fox News segment, where I met a charismatic actor named Antonio Sabato Jr. I had never heard of him. Born in Italy, he became, he told me, a "proud American citizen." He called himself a "Christian conservative" and said that he recently came out in favor of presidential candidate Donald Trump and planned to speak at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. Given Hollywood's hostility toward Republicans, let alone pro-Trump Republicans, I assumed Sabato's career was likely in decline, if, in fact, he ever really had one. Why else would...

A political nuke has detonated in Silicon Valley, and Google is ground zero. Late Tuesday, excerpts from a reportedly leaked internal Google document were published by The Daily Caller. The excerpts, if accurate, confirm what conservatives have long suspected — that conservatives are being actively suppressed by arguably the most powerful company in the world. The Daily Caller reported that a Google blacklist of websites includes right-leaning publishers such as the Conservative Tribune (a property of The Western Journal), as well as “Gateway Pundit, Matt Walsh’s blog, Gary North’s blog ‘teapartyeconomist.com,’ Caroline Glick’s website … and the website of the...

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee warned political strategists and vendors Thursday night that if they support candidates mounting primary challenges against incumbent House Democrats, the party will cut them off from business. The news was officially announced Friday morning, paired with a statement on the committee’s commitment to diversity in consulting — “which, obviously, is just to give themselves cover,” a Democratic political consultant who learned of it Thursday told The Intercept. The consultant asked for anonymity given their relationship with the DCCC, and the party organization’s professed strategy of blacklisting firms that don’t fall in line.

NewsGuard, the news-filtering browser extension recently partnered with Microsoft and run by neoconservatives, Obama-Clinton alumni, and other assorted Trump haters, has advised advertisers to withdraw their business from websites on its blacklist of “unreliable” news websites — a list that includes Breitbart News, The Drudge Report, and the Daily Mail. NewsGuard’s tactic is similar the one used by far-left smear peddlers Sleeping Giants, whose mission is to spread baseless accusations of racism and white supremacy to the advertisers of pro-Trump media outlets in order to put them out of business and silence their voice. Two of the sites on NewsGuard’s...

Can you imagine how scary it would be to live in a world where your livelihood depended on having the ‘correct’ politics? It’s the sort of thing you might expect of totalitarian regimes – Baathist Iraq under Saddam Hussain; everywhere that has ever tried communism; increasingly, Xi’s panopticon China – but definitely not of any liberal democracy in the 21st century. That dystopian future, though, may be much closer than you think. I only properly appreciated this recently when the podcast I’ve been doing for the last few years was mysteriously dropped by my regular employer, forcing me to seek...

Twitter promoted a post advocating for female genital mutilation (FGM) this week, after building a history of blacklisting promoted ads from pro-lifers, before claiming it was an “error.”

WikiLeaks has published a catalog of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement officials with employment history scraped from their LinkedIn profiles. The group known for blasting classified records debuted its “ICEPatrol” project Thursday night with a database of photos, titles, job and school history for more than 9,000 current and former federal employees associated with the agency.

The lead promoter and founder of East Coast Comicon, Cliff Galbraith, bragged on social media about banning Christian conservative actor Kevin Sorbo from the upcoming geek convention in New Jersey because of the actor’s friendship with Sean Hannity. “I turned down Kevin Sorbo for East Coast Comicon,” organizer Galbraith wrote on Facebook over the weekend. “He’s pals with Sean Hannity. Just can’t do it.” As with video games, YA literature, and tech, the comic book and nerd culture convention circuit has become progressively left-leaning over the past few years–and East Coast Comicon is no exception. Its founder, Cliff Galbraith, advertised...

Taylor Swift has remained notoriously tight-lipped on her political leanings, but her friend and back-up dancer Todrick Hall says that anyone who takes her silence as evidence she voted for Donald Trump are making a "huge assumption." Swift faced criticism throughout the election season for remaining mum, and not following in the footsteps of her fellow pop stars, who expressed their support for Hillary Clinton and disdain for Trump. Her sole foray into the world of politics was as an apolitical Instagram post on Election Day telling her followers to "go out and VOTE." But according to Hall, who has...