Congress doesn't trust us with free speech. TikTok proves it. [View all]

A stunning swing toward paternalism

https://wapo.st/4g9JqbN

The United States has long celebrated free speech as one of its core democratic commitments, but in siding with the government against TikTok this month, a circuit court abandoned that value in favor of paternalism.... and handed Congress and the president stunning authority to decide what content Americans can be trusted to consume.

The reasoning isn’t restricted to digital enterprises or apps, either. How about a newspaper with foreign owners? Could the government declare Americans will be too easily manipulated to read content supported by a foreign power? And covert manipulation might happen even without foreign ownership, perhaps through other pressure points such as bribes or sanctions. We should not allow the government to sit “astride the flow” of speech by claiming to protect us from foreign influence, as the Supreme Court warned in an earlier case striking down a ban on foreign propaganda.

While the clock ticks toward a potential shutdown for TikTok, the consequences of this ruling will reverberate long after any ban. Without further review by the Supreme Court, the circuit court’s ruling would leave the door wide open for the government to use national security arguments to limit speech with disturbing results for the First Amendment and the digital public square alike.