Top DOJ official says she’s ‘not familiar’ with landmark censorship case against Biden admin

Kristen Clarke, the Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice (DOJ), said during a House Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday she was “not familiar” with the landmark case Missouri v. Biden that alleges the Biden administration violated Americans’ First Amendment rights.

Republican Rep. Dan Bishop of North Carolina had pressed Clarke about the free speech ramifications of the Missouri v. Biden case, which was taken up by the Supreme Court in October, pointing to the Biden administration’s alleged attempts to use social media companies to suppress online speech. Bishop asked Clarke whether there was any criminal investigation “into the persons responsible for that activity” but Clarke indicated she was unaware of the case to begin with.

“Congressman, I’m not familiar with this litigation, but happy to bring your question back,” Clarke said.

“Thank you, let me just make sure I understand that,” Bishop said. “You are not aware of the Missouri v. Biden litigation that is currently being taken up by the United States Supreme Court, is that correct?”

The Assistant AG for Civil Rights at the DOJ has ZERO awareness of the Missouri v. Biden case, which is set to be heard by SCOTUS.

A US District Court called the Biden admin’s actions in the case “the most massive attack against free speech in United States’ history.”

Wow. pic.twitter.com/61hJBjwr2I

— Rep. Dan Bishop (@RepDanBishop) December 5, 2023

“Unfortunately, I’m not, congressman,” Clarke replied.

In Missouri v. Biden, Republican attorneys general from Missouri and Louisiana accused the Biden administration of colluding with tech companies to censor Americans’ speech, highlighting over 1,400 facts that they said show officials engaged in censorship activities with social media platforms, which were uncovered through internal government documents they gained access to from the lawsuit.

Activities included Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) “switchboards” that allowed state and local election officials to flag misinformation and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) officials flagging social-media posts for removal, along with the FBI planting false information intended to convince platforms to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story.

A lower district court ruled in July that the Biden administration likely violated the First Amendment and barred numerous government agencies, including the DOJ, from certain forms of communication with tech companies, though an appeals court eventually scaled back that injunction. The Supreme Court is expected to make a decision on the case sometime next year, but Justice Samuel Alito raised concerns in October that delaying a decision for several months would give the government a “green light” to censor.

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