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Censorship Industrial Complex

Assistant AG tells House committee she’s ‘not familiar’ with major social media censorship lawsuit

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From LifeSiteNews

By Ashley Sadler

“If the allegations made by the plaintiffs are true, the present case arguably involves the most massive attack on free speech in United States history”

The assistant attorney general for the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division stunned a Republican lawmaker in a Tuesday hearing when she said she hadn’t heard of a major First Amendment lawsuit currently before the U.S. Supreme Court. The case alleges that members of the Biden administration colluded with social media companies to suppress content deemed to be “misinformation,” including COVID-19-related content and information related to Hunter Biden.

In a Tuesday hearing before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government, Assistant AG Kristen Clarke said she was “not familiar” with the ongoing litigation in the first amendment lawsuit Missouri v. Biden, a major case that LifeSiteNews has extensively covered.

Clarke made the remarks after Republican U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina cited a July 4 opinion by Judge Terry Doughty stating that the plaintiffs “are likely to succeed on the merits of their First Amendment claim.” 

“If the allegations made by the plaintiffs are true, the present case arguably involves the most massive attack on free speech in United States history,’” Doughty said in his opinion, which Rep. Bishop referenced in the Tuesday hearing. The U.S. Supreme Court has subsequently agreed to take up the case, now dubbed Murthy v. Missouri.

READ: Supreme Court will decide whether Biden admin illegally pushed Big Tech to censor conservatives

Noting that the litigation has been strictly civil to date, Bishop asked Clarke whether “any criminal investigation or criminal prosecution of the persons responsible for that activity” is “underway in the [DOJ] civil rights division?”

“Congressman, I’m not familiar with this litigation, but [I’m] happy to bring your question back,” Clarke said.

Bishop asked Clarke to confirm whether she was saying she was “not aware of the Missouri v. Biden litigation that is currently being taken up by the United States Supreme Court.”

“Is that correct?” Bishop said.

As LifeSiteNews has reported, the First Amendment lawsuit argues that numerous Biden administration officials had “colluded with and/or coerced social-media platforms to suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content.”

“In their attempts to suppress alleged disinformation, the Federal Government, and particularly the Defendants named here, are alleged to have blatantly ignored the First Amendment’s right to free speech,” the lawsuit claims.

The plaintiffs in the case are two states, Missouri and Louisiana, along with three doctors who have publicly spoken out against the prevailing COVID-19 narrative: Aaron Kheriaty, Dr. Martin Kulldorff, and Dr. Jayanta “Jay” Bhattacharya. Co-Director of Health Freedom Louisiana Jill Hines and Jim Hoft, owner of the news site The Gateway Pundit, are also plaintiffs in the case.

RELATED: This Supreme Court case could strike a blow against the Deep State and Big Tech

In September, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit allowed the suit to proceed against the Surgeon General as well as members of the Executive Office of the President of the United States, the CDC, and the FBI.

According to the filing, the plaintiffs allege that government officials employed “public pressure campaigns, private meetings, and other forms of direct communication” against so-called “disinformation,” “misinformation,” and “malinformation,” and “colluded with and/or coerced social-media platforms to suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content on social-media platforms.”

Per the Fifth Circuit, the plaintiffs “had posts and stories removed or downgraded by” social media companies that government officials had “urged … to remove disfavored content and accounts from their sites.”

The federal court noted that the plaintiffs said the content that was “removed or downgraded” had “touched on a host of divisive topics like the COVID-19 lab-leak theory, pandemic lockdowns, vaccine side effects, election fraud, and the Hunter Biden laptop story.”

“The Plaintiffs maintain that although the platforms stifled their speech, the government officials were the ones pulling the strings,” the ruling stated.

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed in late October to take up the case, though it has allowed the Biden administration to continue its communications with social media companies in the meantime.

Censorship Industrial Complex

Justice Centre campaigning Canadian provinces to follow Alberta’s lead protecting professionals

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Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms

Justice Centre launches national campaign to stop ideological overreach in regulated professions

The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms announces the launch of a national campaign urging all provinces to adopt legislation that restores professional regulators to their proper role of overseeing competence and ethics, rather than compelling speech or imposing political ideology on regulated professionals who serve the public.

Across Canada, professionals such as doctors, nurses, teachers, social workers, engineers, dentists, lawyers and many others are governed by regulatory bodies created to uphold technical competence and ethical standards. Instead of focusing on those core responsibilities, however, many regulators have begun embedding political or ideological content into mandatory courses, codes of ethics and continuing education requirements.

At the same time, professionals are increasingly being investigated or disciplined not for misconduct, but for expressing personal views or declining to endorse political positions.

To help Canadians take action, the Justice Centre has created an online tool with a ready-to-send letter that goes directly to the provincial representatives responsible for the relevant legislation. All the user needs to do is select their province and enter their information, and the tool automatically delivers the letter to the appropriate recipient.

The prepared letter outlines three essential legislative amendments:

  • prohibiting regulatory bodies from pursuing political objectives;
  • prohibiting regulators from monitoring or controlling the speech of their members; and
  • prohibiting regulators from embedding political or ideological content into definitions of competence and ethics.

Alberta is the first province to take meaningful steps toward addressing this growing problem. Its proposed legislation, called the Regulated Professions Amendment Act, is designed to prevent regulators from compelling speech, advancing political objectives or embedding ideology into definitions of competence and ethics.

The Justice Centre encourages all Canadians to visit our website today to take action and help protect the independence of regulated professionals.

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Censorship Industrial Complex

Conservative MP Leslyn Lewis slams Liberal plan targeting religious exemption in hate speech bil

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Bill C-9 is being called an attempt to criminalize sections of the Bible, Quran, Torah, and other sacred texts in Canada.

Canadian Conservative MP Leslyn Lewis blasted a federal government plan to criminalize parts of the Bible as an attack on “Christians,” warning it sets a “dangerous precedent” for Canadian society.

“The Liberal government has agreed to remove the religious exemption in their hate speech bill, C-9, to secure Bloc support and push this bill through Parliament,” Lewis wrote Tuesday on X.

“This is not a minor adjustment. This shift comes at the direct expense of Christians and other religious communities across Canada.”

As reported by LifeSiteNews, a government insider revealed that the Liberal government of Prime Minister Mark Carney plans to remove religious exemptions from Canada’s hate-speech laws by modifying a bill.

Bill C-9, the Combating Hate Act, as reported by LifeSiteNews, has been blasted by constitutional experts as allowing empowered police and the government to go after those it deems have violated a person’s “feelings” in a “hateful” way.

A recent media report states that the Carney Liberals and the separatist Bloc Québécois want to amend Bill C-9, which would “criminalize sections of the Bible, Quran, Torah, and other sacred texts,” Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre noted yesterday on X.

Lewis warned that “no government” should “ever negotiate away religious liberty in exchange for political support.”

“No party should decide which beliefs are acceptable and which ones carry criminal risk,” she warned.

She added that the Liberal government of Carney’s plan to amend Bill C-9 is a “dangerous precedent.”

Poilievre blasted the Liberals’ plan as well, warning Liberal-Bloc amendments to C-9 will “criminalize sections of the Bible, Quran, Torah, and other sacred texts.”

“Conservatives will oppose this latest Liberal assault on freedom of expression and religion,” he noted on X earlier this week.

In response, the party launched a petition over fear that religious texts could be criminalized.

Liberal MP Marc Miller had said earlier in the year that certain passages of the Bible are “hateful” because of what it says about homosexuality and those who recite the passages should be jailed. As reported by LifeSiteNews, he was recently appointed as a government minister by Prime Minister Mark Carney.

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