State Dept. Bars Five Europeans for ‘Extraterritorial Censorship of Americans’
“These radical activists and weaponized NGOs have advanced censorship crackdowns by foreign states—in each case targeting American speakers and American companies.”
The State Department imposed sanctions on five Europeans who participated in censoring Americans.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said:
The State Department is taking decisive action against five individuals who have led organized efforts to coerce American platforms to censor, demonetize, and suppress American viewpoints they oppose. These radical activists and weaponized NGOs have advanced censorship crackdowns by foreign states—in each case targeting American speakers and American companies. As such, I have determined that their entry, presence, or activities in the United States have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.
Based on these determinations, the Department has taken steps to impose visa restrictions on agents of the global censorship-industrial complex who, as a result, will be generally barred from entering the United States. Further, based on the foreign policy determination, the Department of Homeland Security can initiate removal proceedings against certain individuals pursuant to INA section 237(a)(4)(C), which renders such individuals deportable.
In other words, you’re not welcome in America, where we love our First Amendment.
“These sanctions are visa-related,” State Department Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers wrote on X. “We aren’t invoking severe Magnitsky-style financial measures, but our message is clear: if you spend your career fomenting censorship of American speech, you’re unwelcome on American soil.”
Today, the United States issued SANCTIONS reinforcing the "red line" I invoked on @GBNEWS. Namely: extraterritorial censorship of Americans.
Today's sanctions target the censorship-NGO ecosystem.🧵 https://t.co/kaefDo11uh
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) December 23, 2025
Rogers listed the people, none of whom are UK or European Union officials.
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Thierry Breton, a mastermind of the Digital Services Act. In August 2024, while serving as European Commissioner for Internal Markets and Digital Services, he published a letter using the DSA [Digital Services Act] to threaten @elonmusk ahead of his livestream interview with President Trump. Before the interview, Breton ominously reminded Musk of @X’s legal obligations and ongoing “formal proceedings” for alleged noncompliance with “illegal content” and “disinformation” requirements under the DSA.
The DSA sounds great on paper, like most ideas. It’s a “law meant to oversee harmful or manipulative content online.”
Yeah, it’s not about disinformation or harmful content. It’s about views that don’t align with theirs.
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Imran Ahmed, key collaborator with the Biden Administration’s effort to weaponize the government against U.S. citizens. Ahmed’s group, Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), created the infamous “disinformation dozen” report, which called for platforms to deplatform twelve American “anti-vaxxers”, including now-HHS Secretary @SecKennedy. Leaked documents from CCDH show the organization listed “kill Musk’s Twitter” and “trigger EU and UK regulatory action” as priorities. The organization supports the UK’s Online Safety Act and EU’s Digital Services Act to expand censorship in Europe and around the world.
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Clare Melford. She leads Global Disinformation Index (GDI), a UK-based organization that monitors websites for “hate speech” and “disinformation”. If you question Canadian blood libels about residential schools, you’re engaging in “hate speech” according to Melford and GDI. This NGO used @StateDept taxpayer money to exhort censorship and blacklisting of American speech and press. They also joined the deleterious EU Code of Practice on Disinformation.
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Clare Melford. She leads Global Disinformation Index (GDI), a UK-based organization that monitors websites for “hate speech” and “disinformation”. If you question Canadian blood libels about residential schools, you’re engaging in “hate speech” according to… pic.twitter.com/5F3fU4hf4R
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) December 23, 2025
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Anna-Lena von Hodenberg, the leader and founder of HateAid, a German organization founded after the 2017 German federal elections to counter conservative groups. HateAid is an official “trusted flagger” (a censor) under the EU’s anti-speech Digital Services Act (DSA) and routinely demands access to propriety social media platform data to help it censor more. Hodenberg cited threat of “disinformation” from “right-wing extremists” online in upcoming U.S. and EU elections when circulating a petition for the DSA to become more strongly enforced to allow data access for “researchers”.
WE’VE SANCTIONED: Josephine Ballon, co-leader of HateAid, who flags disfavored speech throughout Europe under the Digital Services Act. In addition to her running an official “trusted flagger” body under the DSA, she serves on Germany’s Advisory Council of the Digital Services Coordinator (DSC), which directly advises Germany’s DSC on the application and enforcement of the DSA. In February 2025, Ballon spoke before an American audience in a notable 60 Minutes interview, outlining her position on censorship succinctly: “Free speech needs boundaries.” In October 2024, she vowed to stop the “emotionalization of debates” by “regulating platforms”.
Rogers added:
None of those sanctioned is a current UK or EU official—however, we know that foreign government officials are actively targeting the United States. This week, the UK’s Liberal Democrats claimed President’s Trump National Security Strategy amounts to “foreign interference” by a “hostile foreign state” because it correctly identifies mass migration and decaying national sovereignty as existential European security concerns.
None of those sanctioned is a current UK or EU official—however, we know that foreign government officials are actively targeting the United States. This week, the UK’s Liberal Democrats claimed President’s Trump National Security Strategy amounts to “foreign interference” by a…
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) December 23, 2025
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Comments
If an “NGO” gets most of it’s funding from various governments it is just a GO.
In Europe, they hardly bother to attach the fig leaf anymore.
In the US they still have to play a game of: fatcat donor gives money to a tax-exempt foundation, multiple foundations play hot potato with the money, and eventually one of them gives it to the non-tax-exempt “cause” the donor wanted in the first place.
Don’t forget the fatcat “donations” from the tax payer coffers to a “NGO” filtered through USAID,
Those donations are routed as you said, but then some of it is returned to the sponsor of the donation as “campaign contributions” to the Democratic Party or a particular candidate.
Somehow, I believe we will all survive the blocking of these true fascists from entering our Republic. We will persevere on…
Next step, let’s stop admitting those from third world hell holes who follow a cult religion predicated on our destruction.
Happy Festivus!
To all of my fell LIers, a happy, prosperous, and healthy new year.
fellow…
🎼🎶 all I want for Christmas is an edit button.
Denied!
Well, I just had to go look up what that statute in the INA actually says. It comes in some different parts, but the one cited says:
“(C) Foreign policy
(i) In general
An alien whose presence or activities in the United States the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States is deportable.”
This also refers to being allowed entry. Then there are some exceptions, which read:
“(ii) Exception for officials
An alien who is an official of a foreign government or a purported government, or who is a candidate for election to a foreign government office during the period immediately preceding the election for that office, shall not be excludable or subject to restrictions or conditions on entry into the United States under clause (i) solely because of the alien’s past, current, or expected beliefs, statements, or associations, if such beliefs, statements, or associations would be lawful within the United States.
(iii) Exception for other aliens
An alien, not described in clause (ii), shall not be excludable or subject to restrictions or conditions on entry into the United States under clause (i) because of the alien’s past, current, or expected beliefs, statements, or associations, if such beliefs, statements, or associations would be lawful within the United States, unless the Secretary of State personally determines that the alien’s admission would compromise a compelling United States foreign policy interest.”
I’m guessing that, since these persons who are currently being excluded from entry are NOT considered to be “officials” of the various governments of the countries from which they come, they are covered by the rule under Section (iii).
I had no idea that the Secretary of State could arbitrarily, capriciously, and without judicial oversight decide that somebody was compromising US foreign policy and therefore not allowed into the country. Geez, the entire United Nations representatives and staff should be barred under this law..
I can just imagine what the Dem-wing will do with this power now that the Rep-wingers are exercising it. Ain’t NOBODY with liberty-loving (or even conservative) views from other countries will be allowed in.
Where’s our local law professor to chime in? Milhouse?
IANAL but foreign policy and visas are pretty squarely executive branch prerogatives. Not really clear on why they should be subject to ‘judicial review.’
So are security clearances but the “judicial branch” recently claimed that right too
The Judicial Branch has claimed a right to involve itself into many of the prerogatives of the Executive Branch without regard to separation of powers.
“I had no idea that the Secretary of State could arbitrarily, capriciously, and without judicial oversight decide that somebody was compromising US foreign policy and therefore not allowed into the country.”
Tell me you’re not a Beatles fan without telling me.
Milhouse is on a new-job-related hiatus.
x.com/POLITICOEurope is a trusted flagger.
DSA was created to coordinate censorship rules with the Stanford Internet Observatory.
And then Trump happened.
[…] as a way to get around the First Amendment in 2020 with posts raising concerns about elections and in 2021 with “narratives” expressing concern about the Covid vaccine.”
In the spring of 2022, former President Barack Obama gave a major policy address at Stanford University’s Cyber Policy Center, where he laid out a sweeping proposal for government censorship of social media platforms through the Platform Accountability and Transparency Act.
Obama Encourages Technocratic Censorship of His Political Enemies – American Thinker.
https://archive.org/details/obama-talks-about-disinformation
The archive link has two articles by writers at American Thinker.
——-
Obama talks about disinformation and calls for social media censorship.
April 22, 2022 by Rajan Laad
—–
Obama’s Fundamental Manipulation of Free Speech
May 3, 2022 by Jeannie DeAngelis
—-
For some reason AM doesn’t allow the WayBackMachine to crawl its website so I saved the two articles to Archive.
All that continental haughtiness. One would think Europe was relevant or something.
Where are all the “no kings” protesters when we need them?
At kinara candle-lighting ceremonies. It’s Kwanzaa!
Kwanzaa? Oh, you mean black Festivus.
Good start.
Its only start. Now start sanctioning the fascist leaderships of the EU and its member countries. All of them. Bar them from entry, For that matter, don’t ignore freezing the financial assets of any all sanctioned individuals and groups.
The EU keeps incrementally expanding its scope. Sooner or later the individual Nations of the EU will be at the crossroads of choosing to allow their sovereignty to be subsumed by the EU or to reassert their independence. If they wait too long the rest of the world’s Nations may make the decision for them.
Banning them from our bonnie shores will only mildly inconvenience them.
Trump should ask Musk (as a favor) to ban them from Twitter.
That will smack all of them right where they live, in a truly biblical exercise of eye-for-an-eye justice,
For example, I give you this excerpt from my favorite German blogger, eugyppius, concerning the hapless meat-puppet in the lede photo:
What!!!!?!?!?
“X” can’t ban anyone anymore. That is specifically a Leftist Marxist Democrat position. And since they are out of power, banning the left is not acceptable… to them.
How about “X” just ban all European leadership and police from being able to see the “tweets”.
If the police state can’t see anyone’s opinions then how will they no what anyone says?
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