Senator Josh Hawley demands answers from DHS over social media censorship collusion

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) criticized the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for continuing “disinformation” operations despite the Disinformation Governance Board being disbanded.

The Intercept reported that the DHS was still continuing its speech suppression efforts, citing leaked Facebook documents containing instructions on how law enforcement officers and government workers can access a “Facebook Content Request System.”

In a letter addressed to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Hawley criticized the department for continuing to suppress free speech.

We obtained a copy of the letter for you here.

“…you are yet again hiding information about your efforts to suppress speech you dislike – in flagrant disregard of congressional oversight requests and federal law,” Hawley wrote. “This is unacceptable. You must immediately disclose, publicly, all your efforts to suppress speech.”

“Facebook created a special portal for DHS to streamline directives from your Department to suppress speech,” Hawley wrote.

“While you were publicly announcing that you had disbanded the Disinformation Governance Board, your Department was still ‘having biweekly meetings’ behind closed doors with Facebook to suppress speech,” Hawley added.

Hawley noted that Mayorkas testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in May and said that he would provide all documents related to the DGB.

“When you last appeared before the Senate, you testified under oath in response to my questioning that you ‘owe openness and transparency’ to the Senate and that, absent a legal prohibition, you would ‘produce the documents’ related to your speech-suppression efforts,”

Hawley wrote. “Yet despite my repeated requests for information in letters dated April 28, May 23, July 7, and July 13, you still have not come clean about the full extent of your Department’s operations.”

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