US to ban foreign officials over ‘flagrant censorship’ on social media

WASHINGTON: The US will impose visa bans on foreign nationals it deems to be censoring Americans, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday, and he suggested the new policy could target officials regulating US tech companies.

Rubio did not name any specific instances of censorship. But US tech companies and the Trump administration have challenged US allies in Europe, alleging censorship of social media platforms, but restricting officials from visiting the U.S. appeared to be an escalation by Washington.

Rubio said in a statement that a new visa restriction policy would apply to foreign nationals responsible for censorship of protected expression in the US. He said it was unacceptable for foreign officials to issue or threaten arrest warrants for social media posts made on US soil.

“It is similarly unacceptable for foreign officials to demand that American tech platforms adopt global content moderation policies or engage in censorship activity that reaches beyond their authority and into the United States,” Rubio said.

Some foreign officials have taken “flagrant censorship actions against US tech companies and US citizens and residents when they have no authority to do so,” Rubio said.

US social media companies like Facebook and Instagram parent Meta META.O have said an EU content moderation law, the Digital Services Act, amounts to censorship of their platforms.