When President Trump took office on January 20th, he wasted no time passing a flurry of executive orders, immediately drawing praise from his supporters and outrage from his critics. Among his most controversial orders is one entitled “Restoring the Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship.” Trump has touted it as a heroic directive that will stop the government from infringing on the free speech of ordinary citizens, saying that it has “saved free speech in America.” It accuses the Biden administration of censoring free speech online and strong-arming tech companies into suppressing views the government disagreed with. The order has come under heavy criticism from disinformation experts, who have denounced it as legitimizing conspiracy theories about Democrats colluding with tech companies to silence conservative voices and opening the door for the government to pressure social media companies into abandoning anti-misinformation measures. Nina Jankowicz, who formerly headed Biden’s disinformation board, called it “a direct assault on reality” that “emboldens both foreign actors and disinformation profiteers.” With this order, we are getting a glimpse into how Trump plans to turn social media platforms into rostrums for hate speech and misinformation over the next four years.
Free speech and freedom of expression were central pillars in both of Trump’s campaigns, but do his actions demonstrate the same values? He has painted himself as a champion of the First Amendment, the trustworthy candidate protecting the public’s right to speak their minds, and yet he has consistently demonstrated contempt and disrespect for the press, the right to protest, and freedom of religion. He has sued CNN, The Des Moines Register, and is currently waging a lawsuit against CBS News for editing an interview with Kamala Harris “too favorably.” This has been criticised as a meritless accusation—editing interviews is standard journalistic practice. News outlets are bracing for a crackdown on the free press over Trump’s second term. Not only does Trump try to impede the media when it does not portray him in a positive light, but he is known to actively spread disinformation. He has frequently and publicly lied about the 2020 presidential election being rigged in President Biden’s favour. Fact checkers at The Washington Post actually created a database of all 30,573 false or misleading claims Trump made during his first presidential term; you can search by category.
Trump’s supposed love for free speech is especially ironic when you consider the fact that “fake news” has been one of his most potent rallying cries. He has used it in reference to just about every major media organisation, including CNN, The Washington Post, The New York Times, ABC, NBC, as well as many individual journalists. Its applications are so universal, the phrase has lost its meaning; any negative press coverage Trump faces, he decries it as fake news. These fantasies of victimization have become a fundamental part of his image. His supporters hail him as an audacious, straight-talking statesman who is constantly under attack from the lying liberal media. This mythology has been aided by the social media channels Trump relied on during the campaign for his second term, with conservative social media figures like the Nelk Boys and Charlie Kirk doing much of the heavy lifting in youth outreach on Trump’s behalf. The interview the Nelk Boys conducted with Trump during the home stretch of his campaign was almost immediately taken down by Youtube for violating its misinformation policy.
The executive order comes in tandem with some concerning policy changes from major social media companies Meta and X. Meta, headed by Mark Zuckerberg, has discarded its fact-checking policy and implemented a Community Notes feature in its place. Meta’s platforms, Facebook and Instagram, will no longer take down misleading posts, instead leaving the burden of verifying information on its users. Not only will they no longer fact-check posts, but they have also altered their content moderation policy to loosen restrictions on hate speech. This remodel is predicted to have a negative impact on marginalized communities online. Meta now allows users to accuse people of mental illness on the basis of their sexual orientation and has removed rules banning insults toward people on the basis of race or nationality. Meta’s statement includes a shoutout to Elon Musk’s X, where Community Notes have been a fixture for some time. It praises the system’s success, but Musk’s Community Notes model has been proven to be defective and leave misleading or untrue posts expressing conservative viewpoints unchecked. Musk is no stranger to casting aside content moderation either; in January 2024, he fired 1,000 of X’s ‘safety staff’ who were responsible for stopping hate speech on the platform.
These changes may not seem correlated to Trump’s executive order at first, but there are other executive actions that demonstrate Trump’s desire to bend social media platforms to his will. Trump’s recently appointed Federal Communications Commission Chairman, Brendan Carr, has said that he wants to eliminate Section 230, a law which protects tech companies from liability for user-generated content on their platforms and allows them to decide what content is permitted. Carr, a Project 2025 co-author, has vowed to end the “censorship cartel” that enforces “discrimination against core political viewpoints.” Carr’s plans have been criticized as exceeding the FCC’s power and an effort to force tech companies to reshape their policies to favor conservatives. Digital rights advocate and Fight for the Future Director Evan Greer has lambasted Carr’s ideas, saying, “What he can do and wants to do is use his bully pulpit to bully companies that moderate content in a way he doesn’t like.” Meta and X, it seems, have set a precedent by preemptively bowing to Trump’s wishes for social media platforms to dismantle their moderation and fact-checking policies.
Both Zuckerberg and Musk were present at Trump’s inauguration in January, along with a slew of other billionaires and media moguls. This dubious concurrence of anti-fact checking measures on social media platforms and an executive push against moderation of speech should engender concern for the future of the free press and online discourse in the US. Free speech is a vital and inalienable right that every person is entitled to and a right that should absolutely be protected. These recent crusades, however, are using free speech as a justification for relaxing regulations on hate speech and facilitating the spread of misinformation, which will lead to attacks on minority groups and a misinformed populace. They may not seem like a major threat now, but these actions carry intimations of much bigger plans for the future of political discourse, social media, and the press under the Trump administration.
As young adults in the 21st century, Boston College students spend plenty of time on social media. Many of us have been on the internet since childhood and have a level of trust in what we see online. We have a habit of forgoing legitimate news sources for TikTok videos and Instagram posts. Things are changing. We can no longer be sure that information we come by on social media has been checked by experts. In an era where it’s easier than ever to be duped online, we need to be vigilant in what we choose to consume and think critically about what we see on social media. We also need to exercise our First Amendment rights and call attention to how Trump pushes against the media and his close relationships with tech CEOs. With this all-powerful triumvirate of Zuckerberg, Musk, and Trump charging ahead in their coordinated effort to censor media that criticizes the President, lessen moderation of hate speech and abandon professional fact-checking measures all under the guise of free speech, we very well may be entering the misinformation era.
Decorative postcard admirer and crossword puzzle enthusiast
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