> Two British campaigners are among five people denied US visas after the State Department accused them of seeking to “coerce” American tech platforms into suppressing free speech.
> Imran Ahmed, an ex-Labour adviser who now heads the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), and Clare Melford, CEO of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), were labelled “radical activists” by the Trump administration and banned from entering the US.
> A French ex-EU commissioner and two senior figures at a Germany-based anti-online hate group were also denied visas.
> French President Emmanuel Macron called it “intimidation”, while the UK government said it is “fully committed” to upholding free speech.
> “While every country has the right to set its own visa rules, we support the laws and institutions which are working to keep the internet free from the most harmful content,” a UK government spokesperson said.
> Macron said the US measures “amount to intimidation and coercion aimed at undermining European digital sovereignty”. The EU “strongly condemned” the visa ban and said it had asked the US for clarification. Spain’s foreign ministry meanwhile described the move as “unacceptable measures between partners and allies”.
> The US billed the measures as a response to people and organisations that have campaigned for restrictions on American tech firms, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying they belonged to a “global censorship-industrial complex”.
> He said: “President Trump has been clear that his America First foreign policy rejects violations of American sovereignty. Extraterritorial overreach by foreign censors targeting American speech is no exception.”
> Ahmed from the CCDH, which says it advocates for government action against hate speech and disinformation online, has links to senior Labour figures. He was previously an aide to Labour minister Hilary Benn, and Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney has served as a director of the group he founded.
> The US government labelled Ahmed a “collaborator” for the CCDH’s purported past work with the Biden administration. BBC News has contacted the CCDH for comment.
> Melford founded the GDI, a non-profit that monitors the spread of disinformation, in 2018.
> US Undersecretary of State Sarah B Rogers accused the GDI of using US taxpayer money “to exhort censorship and blacklisting of American speech and press”.
> A GDI spokesperson told the BBC that “the visa sanctions announced today are an authoritarian attack on free speech and an egregious act of government censorship”.
> “The Trump Administration is, once again, using the full weight of the federal government to intimidate, censor, and silence voices they disagree with. Their actions today are immoral, unlawful, and un-American.”
> Also targeted was Thierry Breton, the former top tech regulator at the European Commission, who suggested that a “witch hunt” was taking place.
> Breton was described by the State Department as the “mastermind” of the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), which imposes content moderation on social media firms.
> However, it has angered some US conservatives who see it as seeking to censor right-wing opinions. Brussels denies this.
> Breton has clashed with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and owner of X, over obligations to follow EU rules.
> The European Commission recently fined X €120m (£105m) over its blue tick badges – the first fine under the DSA. It said the platform’s blue tick system was “deceptive” because the firm was not “meaningfully verifying users”.
> In response, Musk’s site blocked the Commission from sharing adverts on its platform.
> Reacting to the visa ban, Breton posted on X: “To our American friends: Censorship isn’t where you think it is.”
> Also subject to bans were Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon of HateAid, a German organisation that the State Department said helped enforce the DSA.
> In a statement to the BBC, the two CEOs called it an “act of repression by a government that is increasingly disregarding the rule of law and trying to silence its critics by any means necessary”.
> They added: “We will not be intimidated by a government that uses accusations of censorship to silence those who stand up for human rights and freedom of expression.”
B0797S458W on
Any sovereign country is entitled to deny access to any person for any reason. I think it takes a certain amount of entitlement to assume you can travel anywhere you wish.
Spamgrenade on
The really disturbing thing about this is that it isn’t Trump personally making that decision, its some faceless civil servant who’s A OK with what’s going on. Same as their military are A OK with killing the survivors of their drug boat missile strikes. Same as the entire Republican party is A OK with allowing Trump to continue his criminal rampage.
NordicBeserker on
Anti disinformation initiatives are anti American and censorship apparently. Because its the one defence in place against bannons “drown the zone”. Even when this is network state techbros trying to bypass sovereignty, Musk wasn’t even against the DSA in 2022. In conclusion.Heritage foundation is a threat to European national security and the new ambassador to Greenland should be sanctioned. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
ChibaCityStatic on
Listen to the Triggernometry podcast with that guy on and you’ll get a taste of the censored hell-scape that guy is on favour of pushing to the UK and US.Â
Astriania on
This is classic petulant Trumpism, and their tantrum should be ignored.
It would be funny to start playing visa escalation and banning high profile social media figures from the UK in response, but it wouldn’t actually help anything and it would just worsen the argument.
But it all fuels the argument that we should be looking to disengage from US tech and develop domestic alternatives, and where that isn’t practical, cooperating with our NW European neighbours on systems less susceptible to petulant individuals.
justasmalltowngirl00 on
Not popular but I’m glad.
These people were going to the USA to push for anti first amendment ideals and values. I see this as no different to the UK not issuing a visa for an American who wanted to come to the UK to push for relaxing gun control or to not issuing a visa to someone from the UAE who wanted to push for banning LGBT.
I’d also suggest people look into these individuals views and what they want to achieve, because you can be sure reddit would not exist as it is in their ideal world.
7 Comments
> Two British campaigners are among five people denied US visas after the State Department accused them of seeking to “coerce” American tech platforms into suppressing free speech.
> Imran Ahmed, an ex-Labour adviser who now heads the Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), and Clare Melford, CEO of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), were labelled “radical activists” by the Trump administration and banned from entering the US.
> A French ex-EU commissioner and two senior figures at a Germany-based anti-online hate group were also denied visas.
> French President Emmanuel Macron called it “intimidation”, while the UK government said it is “fully committed” to upholding free speech.
> “While every country has the right to set its own visa rules, we support the laws and institutions which are working to keep the internet free from the most harmful content,” a UK government spokesperson said.
> Macron said the US measures “amount to intimidation and coercion aimed at undermining European digital sovereignty”. The EU “strongly condemned” the visa ban and said it had asked the US for clarification. Spain’s foreign ministry meanwhile described the move as “unacceptable measures between partners and allies”.
> The US billed the measures as a response to people and organisations that have campaigned for restrictions on American tech firms, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying they belonged to a “global censorship-industrial complex”.
> He said: “President Trump has been clear that his America First foreign policy rejects violations of American sovereignty. Extraterritorial overreach by foreign censors targeting American speech is no exception.”
> Ahmed from the CCDH, which says it advocates for government action against hate speech and disinformation online, has links to senior Labour figures. He was previously an aide to Labour minister Hilary Benn, and Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney has served as a director of the group he founded.
> The US government labelled Ahmed a “collaborator” for the CCDH’s purported past work with the Biden administration. BBC News has contacted the CCDH for comment.
> Melford founded the GDI, a non-profit that monitors the spread of disinformation, in 2018.
> US Undersecretary of State Sarah B Rogers accused the GDI of using US taxpayer money “to exhort censorship and blacklisting of American speech and press”.
> A GDI spokesperson told the BBC that “the visa sanctions announced today are an authoritarian attack on free speech and an egregious act of government censorship”.
> “The Trump Administration is, once again, using the full weight of the federal government to intimidate, censor, and silence voices they disagree with. Their actions today are immoral, unlawful, and un-American.”
> Also targeted was Thierry Breton, the former top tech regulator at the European Commission, who suggested that a “witch hunt” was taking place.
> Breton was described by the State Department as the “mastermind” of the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), which imposes content moderation on social media firms.
> However, it has angered some US conservatives who see it as seeking to censor right-wing opinions. Brussels denies this.
> Breton has clashed with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and owner of X, over obligations to follow EU rules.
> The European Commission recently fined X €120m (£105m) over its blue tick badges – the first fine under the DSA. It said the platform’s blue tick system was “deceptive” because the firm was not “meaningfully verifying users”.
> In response, Musk’s site blocked the Commission from sharing adverts on its platform.
> Reacting to the visa ban, Breton posted on X: “To our American friends: Censorship isn’t where you think it is.”
> Also subject to bans were Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon of HateAid, a German organisation that the State Department said helped enforce the DSA.
> In a statement to the BBC, the two CEOs called it an “act of repression by a government that is increasingly disregarding the rule of law and trying to silence its critics by any means necessary”.
> They added: “We will not be intimidated by a government that uses accusations of censorship to silence those who stand up for human rights and freedom of expression.”
Any sovereign country is entitled to deny access to any person for any reason. I think it takes a certain amount of entitlement to assume you can travel anywhere you wish.
The really disturbing thing about this is that it isn’t Trump personally making that decision, its some faceless civil servant who’s A OK with what’s going on. Same as their military are A OK with killing the survivors of their drug boat missile strikes. Same as the entire Republican party is A OK with allowing Trump to continue his criminal rampage.
Anti disinformation initiatives are anti American and censorship apparently. Because its the one defence in place against bannons “drown the zone”. Even when this is network state techbros trying to bypass sovereignty, Musk wasn’t even against the DSA in 2022. In conclusion.Heritage foundation is a threat to European national security and the new ambassador to Greenland should be sanctioned. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
Listen to the Triggernometry podcast with that guy on and you’ll get a taste of the censored hell-scape that guy is on favour of pushing to the UK and US.Â
This is classic petulant Trumpism, and their tantrum should be ignored.
It would be funny to start playing visa escalation and banning high profile social media figures from the UK in response, but it wouldn’t actually help anything and it would just worsen the argument.
But it all fuels the argument that we should be looking to disengage from US tech and develop domestic alternatives, and where that isn’t practical, cooperating with our NW European neighbours on systems less susceptible to petulant individuals.
Not popular but I’m glad.
These people were going to the USA to push for anti first amendment ideals and values. I see this as no different to the UK not issuing a visa for an American who wanted to come to the UK to push for relaxing gun control or to not issuing a visa to someone from the UAE who wanted to push for banning LGBT.
I’d also suggest people look into these individuals views and what they want to achieve, because you can be sure reddit would not exist as it is in their ideal world.