In April of 2022, the Department of Homeland Security created a "disinformation governance board" for the purpose of combating "misinformation related to homeland security, focused specifically on irregular migration and Russia."
After it was quickly outed as the Biden administration's Ministry of Truth headed by a total nutcase who peddled the Trump-Russia hoax and discredited Hunter Biden laptop theory (and is now a registered foreign agent), DHS killed the Disinformation Governance Board three months later.
Now, House Republicans are set to unveil legislation that would ban the DHS from forming any sort of similar censorship entity, the Washington Examiner reports.
The bill is set for a Thursday introduction by Rep. August Pfluger (R-TX), along with Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Ronny Jackson (R-TX). It would bar federal funds from being "authorized to be appropriated or otherwise made available" to the DHS for the purpose of establishing any sort of similar governance board.
"Partisan government officials running a 'disinformation board' sounds ridiculous to most people, but yet the Biden administration tried to control the speech of American citizens," said Pfluger, who sits on the Homeland Security Committee along with Greene. "DHS should be focused on securing the border and preventing terrorist attacks, not fact-checking social media and censoring Americans."
Republicans have increasingly pursued avenues to restrict the Biden administration's ability to track purported disinformation, including by backing appropriations bills that seek to choke off federal funding for related programs.
For instance, as part of an effort to fight apparent censorship, the GOP-led House Foreign Affairs Committee is mulling not reauthorizing the Global Engagement Center, a State Department-housed interagency the Washington Examiner reported granted $100,000 to the Global Disinformation Index, a British group covertly blacklisting conservative outlets, according to a source familiar. -Washington Examiner
Last May, House Republicans sought to use formal powers to block DHS from operating a so-called governance board - after Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) and 61 GOP members including Pfluger introduced legislation that would "prohibit any federal funds from being used to establish or carry out the activities of any other entity that is substantially similar" to the Disinformation Governance Board, which they nicknamed the "Ministry of Truth."
"Instead of censoring and controlling every aspect of the American public’s lives, DHS should focus on the crisis at the southern border," Jackson told the Examiner. "I have faith in the American people to decipher knowledge for themselves. I do not have any faith in so-called 'disinformation experts' from the Biden administration."
