The soft totalitarianism of the political class

It’s no secret that governments around the world are eroding people’s freedoms. Rights advocates document a nearly two-decade decline in liberty. Civil liberties activists warn of a global recession in free speech. And while American curbs on government power hold up better than their pale equivalents elsewhere, the political class seems determined to end those protections and impose creeping totalitarianism by leveraging the authority of allies in other countries.

American politicians are grateful for foreign censors

“Obrigado Brasil!” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison wrote this week to thank the nation’s authoritarian Supreme Court for its recent ban on the social media platform X.

The court ordered X to censor political views it called “disinformation” and appoint a new legal representative to receive court orders, after the previous one was threatened with arrest. Importantly, the ban threatens ordinary Brazilians with hefty fines if they circumvent the ban on the social media network. Nevertheless, demand for VPNs that break blocks in Brazil surged after the court ruling.

Ellison is working with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, who is the Democratic nominee for vice president and has falsely claimed that “there is no guarantee of free speech about misinformation or hate speech.” He’s also not the only prominent politician who takes a real dislike to X and its CEO, Elon Musk.

“Regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest if he doesn’t stop spreading lies and hatred against X,” snapped Robert Reich, Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration and a former adviser to President Barack Obama, The guard. He cited the recent arrest in France of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov as a precedent. “Like Musk, Durov has positioned himself as an absolutist of free speech,” Reich snorted.

But the hostility is not limited to X, Telegram and their bosses.

“Tech platforms have amplified disinformation and extremism for too long without accountability,” former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton claimed in 2022. “The EU is poised to do something about it. I call on our transatlantic allies to push the Digital Services Act across the finish line and strengthen global democracy before it’s too late.”

Using Foreign Authoritarianism for Domestic Purposes

Why would a former US presidential candidate advocate European rules on free speech?

“The Digital Services Act will effectively force Big Tech to act as a privatized censor on behalf of governments,” Jacob Mchangama, founder of Danish think tank Justitia and executive director of The Future of Free Speech, warned in 2022. “The European policy does not apply in the US, but given the size of the European market and the risk of legal liability, it will be tempting and financially prudent for US-based tech companies to make their global content moderation policies even more dependent on a European approach in order to protect their profits and align their global standards.”

Now in effect, the law is being used to suppress online speech, including as a way to circumvent U.S. protections for speech. It’s not the only overseas circumvention of U.S. law.

Lina, chair of the Federal Trade Commission: “Khan can’t get Congress to pass her anti-monopoly policies and is losing in the U.S. courts, so now she’s pressuring foreign governments to do the anti-corporate work for her.” The Wall Street Journal The editorial board noted last year that Khan is dependent on European regulators.

Behind the scenes pressure for censorship

But attempts to impose control and suppress dissent in the absence of legal authorization or in violation of constitutional protections are also happening here at home. Days after Telegram CEO Durov was arrested in Paris, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg confirmed what had already been revealed by the Twitter and Facebook files: that the government was relying on private companies to suppress dissent and criticism of the bureaucracy.

“Senior officials in the Biden administration, including the White House, have repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humor and satire,” Zuckerberg told the House Judiciary Committee. He also admitted suppressing reports about Hunter Biden’s laptop and its incriminating content under pressure from the FBI.

That includes not only incumbent President Joe Biden, but also Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee. Harris has complained in the past that social media companies “are speaking to millions and millions of people without any kind of oversight or regulation.”

Surveillance is now, it seems, being applied through backchannel pressure and regulation by governments in countries that have no serious protections for free speech. The result is that the role of the United States as a haven for free speech and other freedoms in an increasingly authoritarian world is being threatened.

The political class embraces an increasingly authoritarian world

“Global freedom declined for the 18th consecutive year in 2023. The breadth and depth of the decline were staggering,” Freedom House warned in its 2024 annual report. “Political rights and civil liberties declined in 52 countries, while only 21 countries made improvements.”

“Today we are witnessing the dawn of a recession of free speech,” lamented Justice Mchangama two years ago. “Liberal democracies, instead of standing up to the authoritarian onslaught, are themselves contributing to the recession of free speech.”

This erosion of protections for free speech and other rights is happening with the encouragement of U.S. officials who want more control over our lives, but are (partly) thwarted by U.S. protections for freedom. In a world of global platforms and international travel, these officials are exerting extra-legal pressure and relying on foreign friends to punish people for activities that are legal in the U.S.

Readers will note that most, if not all, of the officials are Democrats. Much ink has been spilled in recent years about the authoritarian drift of the Republican Party, and rightly so. GOP vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance wants to punish ideological opponents and supporters of his allies for “seizing the administrative state for our own purposes” and for “seizing the assets of the Ford Foundation, taxing their assets, and giving them to the people whose lives have been ruined by the radical open borders agenda.”

But as illiberalism rises across the political spectrum, Democrats are leapfrogging authoritarianism to embrace a soft totalitarianism enforced by unofficial pressure and foreign allies subject to minimal constraints on their power. They are ignoring legal restraints and showing contempt for the protections of liberty in this country in their quest to leave no sanctuary for dissent.

If freedom has a future in this country, it will be despite the best efforts of the political class.