![\"US](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/usa-justice-gavel-unsplash.jpg\")
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Former EU commissioner Thierry Breton is among five individuals who have been banned from entering the US in an escalation of the Trump administration\u2019s war against regulation of US tech companies.<\/p>\n
In a statement issued yesterday, US secretary of state Marco Rubio said the five individuals \u201chave led organised efforts to coerce American platforms to censor, demonetise, and suppress American viewpoints they oppose\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese radical activists and weaponised NGOs have advanced censorship crackdowns by foreign states \u2014 in each case targeting American speakers and American companies,\u201d he claimed.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs 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.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the State Department did not initially name the five individuals, they were later identified as Mr Breton alongside Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon of the German NGO HateAid, Clare Melford of the UK-based Global Disinformation Index, and Imran Ahmed, a Briton who serves as chief executive of the US-based Center for Countering Digital Hate.<\/p>\n
All have been involved in efforts to tackle online hateful speech, misinformation and disinformation.<\/p>\n
Mr Rubio said: \u201cPresident 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.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe State Department stands ready and willing to expand today\u2019s list if other foreign actors do not reverse course.\u201d<\/p>\n
Responding on social media, Mr Breton said: \u201cIs McCarthy\u2019s witch hunt back?<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a reminder: 90 per cent of the European Parliament \u2014 our democratically elected body \u2014 and all 27 Member States unanimously voted [for] the DSA.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo our American friends: \u2018Censorship isn\u2019t where you think it is.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former EU commissioner Thierry Breton is among five individuals who have been banned from entering the US in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":652275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49,978,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-652274","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-united-states","9":"tag-us","10":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115774010437254128","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=652274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/652274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/652275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=652274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=652274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=652274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}