The Arizona House Ad Hoc Committee on Oversight, Accountability and Big Tech convened on Tuesday to discuss the influence of Big Tech on free speech.
Chairing the committee was State Rep. Alex Kolodin (R-LD03); the two other members were State Reps. Neal Carter (R-LD15) and Cesar Aguilar (D-LD26). The committee heard testimony from Robert Epstein, a renowned psychologist and Big Tech data researcher, and James Kerwin, senior counsel for Mountain States Legal Foundation. More individuals were reportedly scheduled to testify, but Kolodin disclosed that they were unable to do so for fear of retribution by Google.
Kolodin opened the committee meeting with allegations of the “disturbing parallels” between modern society and the fictional world depicted in the book “1984” by George Orwell. Kolodin referenced the Orwellian concepts of “thoughtcrime” and “newspeak,” claiming further that they exist currently.
“That crime was thoughtcrime, and the crime was not merely that you said something wrong, the crime was that you thought wrong, that you weren’t purely of a mind that matched the party’s ideology,” said Kolodin. “There is a fear that is exactly what’s going on in our country today. There’s an attempt to redefine free speech as misinformation.”
Epstein was the first guest speaker. He summarized his ongoing, near-decade data collection of Google’s practice of creating “ephemeral experiences,” or persuasive search engine results, to influence voters. The term was discovered to be regularly used by Google internally via their company emails.
Epstein dubbed Google’s practice the “Search Engine Manipulation Effect” (SEME).
Based on multiple experiments on SEME conducted domestically and abroad, Epstein determined that the practice consistently influenced voters to shift their voting preferences anywhere from 20 to 80 percent.
“The most disturbing set of scientific findings that I’ve ever encountered in my life. The more we have learned, the more disturbed I have become at what I’m finding,” said Epstein.
AZ Free News reported last November that there was an apparent, consistent bias for two Democratic candidates — then-gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs and then-secretary of state candidate Adrian Fontes — over their respective Republican opponents, Kari Lake and Mark Finchem.
We reported that search results for “Katie Hobbs” brought up her campaign website first, followed by news reports that portrayed her favorably, her Twitter feed, her Wikipedia page, an endorsement by Emily’s List, her Ballotpedia, and her Facebook.
By contrast, a search for “Kari Lake” didn’t yield her campaign website on any of the first 11 search result pages, and didn’t appear even when omitted results were included. Her search results yielded a Wikipedia page first alongside unfavorable media coverage.
It wasn’t until after our report was published that search results for Kari Lake were modified. Epstein declared during Tuesday’s meeting that Google’s interference resulted in a race-determining advantage for Hobbs.
“If you took Google out of that picture, Kari Lake would’ve won,” said Epstein.
According to Epstein’s data collection, Google would also discriminately deploy voting reminder graphics to certain voters at certain times, with reported favoritism to Democratic voters. Some voters reportedly didn’t get a reminder to vote.
Epstein disclosed that he voted for both Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020, but that he was concerned with Google’s influence over private decision-making.
“I object to the fact that a private company that is not accountable to the public in any way is messing with our elections,” said Epstein.
Epstein proposed implementing a monitoring system that would prevent manipulation from Google in the future.
After an hour break, Kerwin testified on the relationship between government and Big Tech concerning censorship. He explained that government wording in its communications determines whether a constitutional violation occurred. In most cases, Kerwin declared that the open relationship between government and social media companies to monitor speech exists in a “gray area” within the law.
Kerwin cited the ongoing case, Missouri v. Biden, as a “watershed” case on this gray area. The Biden administration was sued for coordinating with social media companies to flag and remove posts, and the federal judge in the case determined that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail based on preliminary evidence produced.
That’s when Kerwin broached the subject of Gov. Katie Hobbs. Kerwin reviewed several emails from Hobbs’ secretary of state staff requesting that Twitter remove certain tweets they classified as misinformation or disinformation.
“This suggests a troubling intention on part of a government official to stamp out speech they disagree with,” said Kerwin.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
Higher education, ideally a bastion of free thought and inquiry, should eagerly embrace a multitude of voices and perspectives—we usually call that thinking and learning. Yet, in practice, the ubiquitous doctrines of inclusion inscribed into university charters are not without exceptions. These exceptions materialize from the judgments of self-appointed arbiters of speech, who wield the authority to classify ideas and individuals as hateful and unsafe as they break from a general orthodoxy of perspective. Disguised as protections of students from pernicious notions, these arbiters diligently strive to condemn, censor, and chill speech they do not like – while university leadership does nothing.
I experienced this exact condemnation when I orchestrated a university-sanctioned event in my capacity as the Executive Director of the T.W. Lewis Center for Personal Development at ASU’s Barrett Honors College. The event, titled “Health, Wealth, and Happiness,” took place at ASU Gammage Auditorium on February 8, 2023. Esteemed experts joined the panel, with Dr. Radha Gopalan, a distinguished heart transplant cardiologist, engaging on health; Robert Kiyosaki, expert on money and the acclaimed author of “Rich Dad Poor Dad,” delving into wealth; and Dennis Prager, co-founder of PragerU and, for over 40 years running, a nationally syndicated radio host, addressing happiness. Complementing the panelists were speakers Charlie Kirk, the visionary behind Turning Point USA, and Tom Lewis, a notable businessman, philanthropist, and namesake donor of the Lewis Center.
At Arizona State University (ASU), the culture of arbitration of speech has infiltrated deeply. This might come as a surprise given ASU’s acclaimed reputation for its free speech policies and its president’s commitment to this cause. In June, I published editorials in the Wall Street Journal“I Paid for Free Speech at Arizona State” and in the National Review, “Some Universities Care About Free Speech…Until They Don’t,” in which I revealed the free speech crisis at ASU’s Barrett Honors College while I also praised ASU for its free speech policies, at least as they state them on paper. I had hoped for a steadfast defense against blatant infringements on free speech that undermine ASU’s policies and declarations. Regrettably, my optimism faded. With each day, ASU’s actions, or lack thereof, erode my confidence in their stated defense of free speech.
It is imperative to grasp the suppression of speech in our academic institutions and to fully comprehend the essence of true freedom of thought which can only come from true freedom of speech. Only then can we embark on endeavors that genuinely promote the education and advancement of society.
ASU President Michael Crow may declare that “speakers speak at ASU,” but can we truly consider speech as free when over 80% of the faculty retaliates against speech they deem “wrong”? Do free speech ideals hold when deans prescribe limitations on speakers’ speech? Can we claim freedom of speech when marketing materials are removed due to faculty offense, while contrasting viewpoints bask in promotional spotlight? Is speech uninhibited when professors dedicate valuable class time to condemn the speech of other units? Does true free speech persist when professors discourage student participation in an event? And then stand vigilantly at the event entrance, watching attendees approach. Can we genuinely say that speech is free when college deans fire leaders and dismantle centers that uphold values no longer in harmony with the college’s leanings? The resounding answer is no. This is free speech under siege.
On August 3, 2023, a group of scholars who convened at Princeton established the “Princeton Principles for a Campus Culture of Free Inquiry.” This assembly distinctly underscores the pressing predicament faced by numerous higher education institutions that falter in upholding cultures of robust and uninhibited speech.
The Princeton Principles squarely confront this concern: “Some members of the university community argue that robust freedom of inquiry permits speech that can ‘harm’ students’ well-being or hinder institutional efforts to attain particular conceptions of social justice or ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion.’”
The case of the Lewis Center is illustrative, with 39 of the 47 Barrett Honors College faculty launching a nationwide condemnation campaign against the Health, Wealth, and Happiness program, speakers, donors, and staff. The Barrett deans actively endorsed this campaign and exercised censorship of speech the faculty found objectionable. The campaign led to intimidations and firings, which is to say prices to pay—sanctions—for exercising free inquiry and speech.
Having policies and ratings extolling free speech alone isn’t enough if university leadership doesn’t enforce their own standards. My experiences at ASU revealed a bureaucratic machinery that prioritizes safeguarding the institution’s interests over addressing free speech violations. I spent months reporting these violations internally and escalated the matter to ASU’s upper echelons and even testified in a legislative hearing. As of mid-August 2023, ASU and its board maintain that they have discovered “a series of examples of unfettered free speech,” aligning with the arbiters.
Self-governance alone proves inadequate in safeguarding our First Amendment rights on campus. The arbiters of speech are not likely to relinquish their control in the absence of decisive action by leadership. The responsibility rests upon parents, students, donors, the media, concerned citizens, and elected officials to unite and reestablish freedom of speech without fear of retribution, for there is no freedom of anything if it comes with a penalty for its exercise, including speech.
The Princeton Principles underscore that “If there is clear and convincing evidence that faculty members and administrators are not adequately fulfilling their responsibilities to foster and defend a culture of free inquiry on campus, other agents including regents, trustees, students, and alumni groups in the wider campus network may and indeed should become involved.”
Gratitude must be extended to parents, students, alumni, donors, lawmakers, and concerned citizens for following this story who rallied behind the cause of free speech. Special acknowledgment should be given to leaders like Arizona Senator Anthony Kern and State Representative Quang Nguyen for co-chairing the Joint Legislative Ad Hoc Committee on the Freedom of Expression at Arizona’s Public Universities. And sincere thanks should be extended to Arizona Speaker of the House Ben Toma and Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen for their unwavering support of free speech for all.
Despite receiving broad support, sustained vigilance is imperative. We must persist in recognizing speech suppression and holding university leadership accountable for defending the realm of free speech, even for ideas deemed offensive, such as, laughably, health, wealth, and happiness.
Ann Atkinson can be reached at her Twitter handle, @Ann_Atkinson_AZ.
A Pew Research poll released July 20 found that 70% of Democrats think the government should restrict what appears on social media, a dramatic change from five years ago when a majority of Democrats supported a free marketplace of ideas.
It’s no wonder, considering the drumbeat of warnings from leftist politicians and their liberal media allies about “disinformation” and “misinformation.”
But be warned: Democracy cannot survive for long if one of the nation’s two major political parties wants to put blinders on the public, limiting their access to information and canceling political opponents. That’s a rigged system. Ask the Iranians, Russians or Chinese.
A House hearing on July 20 held by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government showed that the Biden administration is already censoring social media on a massive scale, putting blinders on all of us.
Hearing witness D. John Sauer, special assistant attorney general for Louisiana, described preliminary findings by a federal judge that Biden staff in the White House, the FBI, the Department of Health and Human Services, and almost every other executive department meet regularly with social media executives and pressure them to remove or demote criticisms of Biden economic and energy policies, Biden family members, and even items that depict the first lady in an unflattering way. According to Sauer, “millions of American voices” have been silenced in violation of the First Amendment.
Sauer cited some 18,000 communications from Team Biden to tech executives orchestrating a vast ongoing censorship operation.
Yet Democratic lawmakers were unfazed by this shocking evidence, and hardly questioned the witness. The U.S. Constitution and the future of our democracy be damned.
Rep. Stacey Plaskett laid out the Democratic Party’s distorted interpretation of the First Amendment, insisting that not all speech is constitutionally protected and offering hate speech as an example.
Plaskett and like-minded Dems need a refresher course on the Constitution and American history. The Supreme Court has ruled again and again that all speech, especially speech we like the least, is protected. That includes Nazi marches and cross burnings, as odious as these are. Who needs a constitutional amendment to protect speech everyone likes?
In 2017, the Court ruled unanimously in Matal v. Tam that the First Amendment requires “we protect the freedom to express ‘the thought that we hate,’” citing Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.’s dissent in the 1929 case United States v. Schwimmer.
Rep. Gerry Connolly aimed his wrath at witness Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose views on vaccines and other pandemic policies were censored. Connolly said this censorship “was not big brother government trying to exercise its will on an innocent population. It was public health measures to protect lives.”
Connolly’s wrong. Censoring scientific debate was a lethal mistake. If competing scientific viewpoints, especially about masking and lockdowns, had been considered, harm to schoolchildren, business owners, and many others might have been prevented. Turns out, official government policy was based on “misinformation” and “disinformation.”
During the hearing, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, battered Kennedy with accusations of antisemitism and racism for his outrageous comments about the disparate impact of COVID on different ethnic groups. But when he tried to respond, she barked “reclaiming my time” and “ask the witness to stop talking.”
Whether you think RFK Jr. is loony or a viable presidential contender, as a witness he should have been treated with civility. Wasserman Schultz’s abuse is reminiscent of how Sen. Joseph McCarthy browbeat witnesses during the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954. Those hearings ended abruptly when McCarthy was asked, “Have you no sense of decency?” Wasserman Schultz should have been confronted with the same question.
The attacks on RFK Jr. were a sideshow. The main event was the Democrats’ concocted defense of censorship. The Democrats’ own witness — civil rights attorney Maya Wiley — testified that “the ability of every person to have access to accurate and reliable information is a cornerstone of our democracy.”
Wiley’s slippery language is meant to evade the real issue: Who decides what is accurate and reliable?
Wiley was asked directly by Rep. Chris Stewart, “Do you trust the government to determine what facts and views the American people are exposed to?” She replied, “I think I’m struggling with the question.”
Tell Democrats the answer is a resounding “no.”
Trusting government to be your eyes and ears is crazy.
Betsy McCaughey is a contributor to The Daily Caller News Foundation and a former lieutenant governor of New York and chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. Follow her on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey. To find out more about Betsy McCaughey and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
It looks like we struck a nerve at one of the largest universities in the United States. Last week, the Free Enterprise Club published an article on Arizona State University’s (ASU) failure to uphold free speech. The article came in the aftermath of an event held by the T.W. Lewis Center for personal development—a center of the Barrett Honors College—that featured prominent conservative speakers like Robert Kiyosaki, Dennis Prager, and Charlie Kirk.
While the event was allowed to proceed, it faced a campaign from 39 of the 47 faculty from the honors college who tried to shut it down. Then, in the months following the event, the center was not only dissolved, but two staff members lost their jobs. Now, ASU has offered a “fact check” of our article in a desperate attempt to save face. And as you might expect, it’s another swing and miss…
Jonathan Haidt is a professor at NYU, an acknowledged leader in the field of social psychology, and a champion of free speech. He recently faced a requirement that all scholars wishing to present research to the Society for Personality and Social Psychology were to submit a statement explaining “whether and how this submission advanced the equity, inclusion, and antiracism goals of SPSP.”
He resigned instead. This was no small sacrifice, but Haidt takes his principles seriously. Moreover, as he pointed out on his way out the door, “Most academic work has nothing to do with diversity.”
Scholars working, for example, on ultra-bright, nano-structured photo emission electron studies would be required to present their “anti-racist” bona fides. Academics in all disciplines, as well as administrators, would be forced to “betray their quasi-fiduciary duty to the truth by spinning, twisting or otherwise inventing some tenuous connection to diversity.”
This is not just another quibble among pointy-headed academics. Refusing jobs to dissenters is meant to quash the last remnant of open debate in American higher education.
Our universities, particularly the elite, were once celebrated as sanctuaries for unpopular ideas, where free discourse was sacrosanct and none need face fear of censure over doctrinal disputes.
But when the Left achieved numerical domination in the majority of universities over recent decades, their mindset evolved into rooting out the few dissenters in their midst, or, better yet, blocking them from getting a job in the first place.
The reason so-called anti-racists feel justified in forcing their views into unrelated disciplines, such as the hard sciences, is that they view the entire world through the lens of race. Ibram S. Kendi, the leading proponent of anti-racism, writes “there is no such thing as a non-racist or race-neutral policy.”
Their opinions on everything from raising taxes (good) to merit-based promotion in schools (bad) are race-based. It follows that if you disagree with their views, then you’re a racist.
The philosophy of anti-racism is profoundly anti-education and anti-merit. Colleges and universities are less and less committed to the search for truth or the transmission of knowledge. Instead, they are in thrall to the endless dictates of the ironically titled “social justice” bureaucracy.
DEI offices, larger than many academic departments (and better paid), are now sprouting in the halls of academia. 25% of all universities now mandate DEI statements from job applicants, and 40% more are considering jumping on the bandwagon.
DEI statements are loyalty oaths to race-based ideologies, similar to those required by authoritarian regimes throughout history. They often demand evidence of the applicant’s past support of such notions as Critical Race Theory, which holds that an individual’s tendency to racial bias can be reliably determined from their skin color.
To our state’s shame, Arizona’s universities have enthusiastically thrown themselves into the front lines of this movement. According to a Goldwater Institute report, Arizona State University last fall required DEI loyalty oaths for 81% of all job applicants. NAU was at 73% while the University of Arizona demanded 28% bend the knee to be considered for a job.
Such required ideological allegiance makes a mockery of the value of any research these aspiring scholars may do. The results are predetermined. In 2020, two major research organizations and 16 scientific societies issued a joint statement that researchers “must stand against the notion that systemic racism does not exist.” No research was cited.
Topics like urban crime, immigration, and welfare fraud are rarely studied when only the approved narrative is permitted anyway. Ignoring data inconsistent with the agenda gives us startling conclusions as when “scientists” proclaimed that family dinners and church services were COVID “superspreaders,” while massive racial protests and pro-abortion rallies were no problem.
The Left has a way with words. Diversity now means rigid conformity. Equity stands for unearned equal outcomes. Inclusion means exclusion of dissenters.
But Americans are starting to catch on. Outraged parents are protesting overt racism in school curricula. A growing number of universities and corporations are pulling back on DEI mandates. In Arizona, SCR 1024 is a proposed constitutional amendment that will hopefully be on the ballot next election. It would eliminate racist instruction in our public schools.
Take heart.
Dr. Thomas Patterson, former Chairman of the Goldwater Institute, is a retired emergency physician. He served as an Arizona State senator for 10 years in the 1990s, and as Majority Leader from 93-96. He is the author of Arizona’s original charter schools bill.
