In NCLA Victory Against Censorship, State Department Shutters Global Engagement Center

The Daily Wire, The Federalist, State of Texas v. Department of State, et al.

/EIN News/ -- Washington, D.C., Jan. 02, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The U.S. Department of State has closed its Global Engagement Center (GEC), which it had used to finance the development and promotion of censorship technology and enterprises that then blacklisted domestic news organizations. The New Civil Liberties Alliance celebrates this encouraging step as we lead the ongoing The Daily Wire, The Federalist, Texas v. Dep’t of State lawsuit against the State Department’s efforts to silence members of the American press. The suit has been stayed until February 18, with NCLA continuing to review and obtain discovery aimed at exposing the true depth of the government’s egregious censorship regime.

State Department-backed censorship technologies and enterprises like NewsGuard and the Global Disinformation Index have targeted media outlets that oppose the government’s narrative, including The Daily Wire and The Federalist, seeking to suppress their views by limiting their circulation and depriving them of advertising dollars. Such blacklists seek to discredit and demonetize American media outlets they brand “risky” or “unreliable,” aiming to redirect advertisers’ money and audiences to outlets that publish government-favored viewpoints.

The State Department’s censorship regime violates the First Amendment rights of The Daily Wire, The Federalist, numerous similar outlets, and their readers. NCLA’s clients are very likely to succeed in their ultra vires and First Amendment claims. When censorship-related activity by the State Department’s National Endowment for Democracy (NED) was first disclosed in 2023, NED’s board immediately shuttered that unconstitutional program. The State of Texas has joined NCLA in this lawsuit, recognizing that the State Department lacks authority to fund and market censorship technologies for use against domestic targets and that doing so interferes with its sovereign interest in enforcing Texas’s law requiring social media companies with market power to provide non-discriminatory services as a common carrier.

NCLA released the following statements:

“Government shouldn’t be in the business of policing speech online. Dismantling the GEC is a step in the right direction, but NCLA remains committed to ensuring that our clients and other Americans do not continue to have their speech suppressed by government bureaucrats who have no respect for the First Amendment and believe they know best what Americans should be able to read, hear and say online.”
— Jenin Younes, Litigation Counsel, NCLA

“It is heartening to see Congress has refused to continue funding the GEC—a government center antithetical to a free press. NCLA remains concerned, however, that the State Department has ‘realigned’ GEC personnel and funds to other areas of the State Department and to date has refused to even provide a copy of the notice of the realignment the agency shared with Congress nearly a month ago.”
— Margot Cleveland, Of Counsel, NCLA

For more information visit the case page here.

ABOUT NCLA

NCLA is a nonpartisan, nonprofit civil rights group founded by prominent legal scholar Philip Hamburger to protect constitutional freedoms from violations by the Administrative State. NCLA’s public-interest litigation and other pro bono advocacy strive to tame the unlawful power of state and federal agencies and to foster a new civil liberties movement that will help restore Americans’ fundamental rights.

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Joe Martyak
                    New Civil Liberties Alliance
                    703-403-1111
                    joe.martyak@ncla.legal