In a statement, U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said the affected individuals were part of what he described as a coordinated effort to promote censorship against American speakers and firms.
The United States State Department has announced visa bans on five individuals, including a former European Union commissioner, accusing them of seeking to “coerce” American social media companies into suppressing viewpoints they oppose.
In a statement, U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said the affected individuals were part of what he described as a coordinated effort to promote censorship against American speakers and firms.
“These radical activists and weaponised NGOs have advanced censorship crackdowns by foreign states, in each case targeting American speakers and American companies,” Rubio said, according to the BBC.
Among those named is Thierry Breton, the former European Commission commissioner responsible for the internal market and digital regulation.
The State Department described Breton as the “mastermind” behind the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), legislation that imposes strict content moderation obligations on major technology platforms.
The DSA has drawn criticism from some U.S. conservatives, who argue it is designed to suppress right-wing opinions.
European Union officials have repeatedly denied this, insisting the law is aimed at tackling illegal content and disinformation online.
Reacting to the visa ban, Breton rejected the accusations and suggested he was being unfairly targeted.
“A witch hunt” was taking place, he reportedly said, adding, “To our American friends: Censorship isn’t where you think it is.”
Breton has previously clashed with Elon Musk, the owner of X, over the platform’s obligations to comply with EU digital regulations.
Earlier this year, the European Commission fined X €120m (£105m) over its blue tick verification system, the first fine imposed under the DSA.
The Commission said the system was “deceptive” because users were not being “meaningfully” verified.
In response, X blocked the Commission from advertising on the platform.
Also listed in the visa bans is Clare Melford, who leads the UK-based Global Disinformation Index (GDI).
The U.S. Undersecretary of State Sarah B Rogers accused the organisation of using American taxpayer funds “to exhort censorship and blacklisting of American speech and press.”
A GDI spokesperson strongly criticised the move, telling the BBC that “the visa sanctions announced today are an authoritarian attack on free speech and an egregious act of government censorship”.
“The Trump Administration is, once again, using the full weight of the federal government to intimidate, censor, and silence voices they disagree with. Their actions today are immoral, unlawful, and un-American,” the spokesperson said.
Imran Ahmed, founder of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), was also subjected to a visa ban.
Rogers described Ahmed as a “key collaborator with the Biden Administration’s effort to weaponize the government against US citizens.”
Two executives of the German organisation HateAid, Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon, were also affected. The State Department said HateAid had helped enforce the DSA.
In a joint statement to the BBC, the two CEOs described the decision as “an act of repression by a government that is increasingly disregarding the rule of law and trying to silence its critics by any means necessary.
“We will not be intimidated by a government that uses accusations of censorship to silence those who stand up for human rights and freedom of expression,” they said, according to the BBC.
Rubio said the measures were aimed at “agents of the global censorship-industrial complex," adding that those targeted would be “generally barred from entering the United States."
“President Trump has been clear that his America First foreign policy rejects violations of American sovereignty.
Extraterritorial overreach by foreign censors targeting American speech is no exception,” he said.