US bars ex-EU tech chief and activists in social media ‘censorship’ row
In a sharply worded statement, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the group had helped drive “censorship crackdowns by foreign states” that targeted “American speakers and American companies”.
The United States has imposed visa bans on five European figures, including former EU commissioner Thierry Breton, accusing them of trying to pressure American social media firms into silencing views they oppose.
In a sharply worded statement, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the group had helped drive “censorship crackdowns by foreign states” that targeted “American speakers and American companies”.
The State Department described Mr Breton, the EU’s former internal market commissioner and chief digital regulator, as the “mastermind” of the bloc’s Digital Services Act (DSA) – a law that compels big online platforms to police content more aggressively.
The DSA has been welcomed in Brussels as a tool to tackle disinformation and harmful content but has drawn anger from parts of the American right, who see it as a vehicle for suppressing conservative voices.
Mr Breton, who has repeatedly clashed with Elon Musk over the enforcement of EU rules on X (formerly Twitter), suggested the move was politically driven.
Posting on X after the announcement, he wrote: “To our American friends: Censorship isn’t where you think it is.”
Earlier this year the European Commission fined X €120m (£105m) in the first penalty issued under the DSA, ruling that the platform’s paid blue tick system was misleading because users were not “meaningfully verified”. In response, X blocked the Commission from advertising on the platform.
Three leading figures from civil society groups were also named in the visa ban.
Clare Melford, head of the UK-based Global Disinformation Index (GDI), was accused by US Undersecretary of State Sarah B Rogers of using US taxpayer funds “to exhort censorship and blacklisting of American speech and press”.
In a statement to the BBC, a GDI spokesperson condemned the move as “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,” the group said.
Imran Ahmed, head of the US- and UK-based Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), which campaigns against online hate and disinformation, was also sanctioned.
Ms Rogers described him as “a key collaborator with the Biden Administration’s effort to weaponize the government against US citizens”. The BBC has contacted CCDH for comment.
The remaining two individuals are Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon, senior figures at German organisation HateAid, which supports victims of online abuse and has worked closely with EU regulators.
The State Department accused HateAid of helping to enforce the DSA in a way that undermines free expression.
In a joint statement to the BBC, the pair called the visa ban “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”.
“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,” they said.
Mr Rubio said Washington had moved to restrict entry to “agents of the global censorship-industrial complex who, as a result, will be generally barred from entering the United States”.
He framed the decision as part of former President Donald Trump’s “America First” foreign policy.
“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,” he said.
