Trump Vows to Ban Government From Labeling ‘Misinformation’ or ‘Disinformation’ If Reelected

Former President Donald Trump has vowed to ban the government from labeling what is “misinformation” or “disinformation” were he to be president again.

“If we don’t have free speech then we just don’t have a free country, it’s as simple as that,” he said in a video posted on his social media site, Truth Social. “If this most fundamental right is allowed to perish, then the right of our rights and liberties will topple, just like dominos, one-by-one they’ll go down.”

Trump said that, hours following his inauguration, he would “sign an executive order banning any federal department or agency from colluding with any organization, business or person to censor, limit, categorize or impede the lawful speech of American citizens. I will then ban federal money from being used to label domestic speech as mis- or disinformation.”

Notably, since 2016, several foreign governments have worked to weaponize social media to meddle in U.S. elections, which has led to an ongoing debate in the U.S. about content moderation and censorship online.

Trump also said he would fire any federal officials engaging in domestic censorship “directly or indirectly.”

Trump also promised he would have the DOJ investigate censorship efforts and prosecute where applicable.

He would call on Congress to send him a bill reforming Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act “to get big online companies out of censorship business.”

Trump said federal funds would be stripped from higher education and nonprofit institutions engaging in censorship.

“If any U.S. university is discovered to have engaged in censorship activities or election interferences in the past, such as flagging social media content for removal of blacklisting, those universities should lose federal research dollars and federal student loan support for a period of five years, and maybe more,” he said.

Trump said he would implement a several-year cooling off period for employees at the FBI, CIA, NSA, Director of National Intelligence, Department of Homeland Security, or Department of Defense from taking a job at a company “possessing vast quantities of U.S. user data.”

Additionally, Trump said he’d have Congress pass a Digital Bill of Rights that would require U.S. government officials to get a court order before removing online content and notify those whose content gets removed, the reason for the removal, and the right to an appeal.

Finally, Trump called for those 18 years and older to be able to opt-out of having their content moderated.

Watch above.