On 11/17/2022, Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) blasted Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for “pressuring Big Tech to treat American citizens as if they’re threats to Homeland.” Senator Hawley has demanded an explanation from Mayorkas over DHS’s disinformation campaign. Sen. Hawley asked Mayorkas about the Biden administration allegedly flagging social media posts as “disinformation” during the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing. Mayorkas repeatedly said this was false. Hawley asked, “Here’s another email. August 20, 2021, Facebook writes again to HHS and highlights that Facebook is increasing the strength of our demotions for … April 16, 2021, Rob Flaherty at the White House circulates a Zoom meeting invitation to Twitter employees stating White House staff will be briefed by Twitter … We have example after example of this administration coordinated, apparently, according to a federal court, your agency pressuring, and coercing social media companies to engage in censorship. Is that constitutional?”
Mayorkas: That is unequivocally false.
Hawley: It’s what the emails show.
Mayorkas: That is unequivocally false, Senator.
Hawley: You are not pressuring the big tech companies to take down accounts. You are not meeting with them to ask them to censor on your behalf?
Mayorkas: That is correct. We are not.
Hawley: You’re not having any meetings with them whatsoever.
Mayorkas: We meet with the tech companies to address the Homeland Security mission.
Hawley: “You have turned your agency into a censorship machine. If you’re not treating Americans as domestic terrorists then why is that you’re pressuring Big Tech to treat American citizens as if they’re a threat to Homeland?”
Mayorkas: “We don’t instruct any Big Tech.”
Hawley: “A federal judge has found a finding of fact, Mr. Secretary, that your office, and I am going to quote now, is ‘supervising the nerve center of federally directed censorship.’”
“A federal judge in a federal lawsuit [has said] you are supervising the nerve center of federally directed censorship… Is that constitutional?”
Mayorkas: It is unequivocally false.
Hawley: You are not pressuring Big Tech to take down accounts?
Mayorkas: Correct. We meet with the tech companies to address the Homeland Security mission…
Hawley: Here’s my point, Mr. Secretary, it has been established for years in this country… that the federal government may not use private third parties to engage in activities that are unconstitutional… You are leveraging private companies to carry out censorship on your behalf. It is dystopian, but worse than that, it is unconstitutional.
Mayorkas: It is also false.
https://facebook.com/HygoNewsUSA/videos/5626255307494004
Hawley: turned DHS into censorship machine? Mayorkas: unequivocally false!