By Ryan Morgan
Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on May 28 new visa restrictions against foreign nationals involved in censoring the speech of U.S. citizens.
“For too long, Americans have been fined, harassed, and even charged by foreign authorities for exercising their free speech rights,” Rubio announced in a post on social media platform X.
“Today, I am announcing a new visa restriction policy that will apply to foreign officials and persons who are complicit in censoring Americans. Free speech is essential to the American way of life—a birthright over which foreign governments have no authority.”
Rubio said foreign nationals involved in suppressing the rights of Americans shouldn’t be allowed to visit the United States.
“Whether in Latin America, Europe, or elsewhere, the days of passive treatment for those who work to undermine the rights of Americans are over,” he said.
The Epoch Times reached out to the State Department for more details about Rubio’s reasons for adopting this new policy position, but the department did not immediately respond to the request for comment.
Trump Media & Technology Group, which operates Truth Social, and the video-sharing platform Rumble have recently challenged an order issued by Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes for the U.S. media companies to remove accounts belonging to a prominent supporter of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
In February, a U.S. federal judge ruled that Rumble and Trump Media could ignore the order of the Brazilian court.
Elon Musk, an adviser to the White House and the owner of social media platform X, has also clashed with Moraes over the Brazilian judge’s demands to block certain accounts on the platform.
At a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last week, Rubio told lawmakers he was reviewing potential sanctions against Moraes.
During that same hearing, Rubio said, “We need to be strong defenders of free speech everywhere in the world and anywhere in the world where it’s being threatened, including, sadly, parts of Europe, where we’re seeing truth and we’re seeing free speech now being endangered.”
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