The government funding bill includes a one-year extension of the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), an agency that provides funding to organizations that censor conservative media, including USA Journal. The provision extending funding for the program appears on page 139 of the 1,537-page continuing resolution, which was unveiled Tuesday night, just hours before the House is set to vote on the short-term spending bill.
The Washington Examiner’s Gabe Kaminsky posted on Twitter that the bill “includes a one-year extension on the State Department’s Global Engagement Center — the agency me and Matt Taibbi reported has funded speech suppression efforts and is being sued by the Federalist and Daily Wire.” The GEC is facing lawsuits over its funding of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), a British organization that pressures advertisers to defund right-leaning media outlets in the U.S., and NewsGuard, a blacklisting group that rates the “misinformation” levels of news outlets to target conservative voices for censorship.
Several congressional investigations have examined the GEC’s funding of organizations that engage in censorship of conservatives and restrict free speech, Breitbart News reported. In September, a congressional report raised significant concerns about the GEC, including its funding of groups that targeted and censored small businesses in the United States, thus exceeding its mandate to address foreign disinformation.
The report from the House Small Business Committee claimed that the GEC, with an estimated budget of $61 million and a staff of 125, has been financing groups involved in domestic censorship, diverting from its primary mission of combating foreign disinformation. In an August interview on “Real Talk with Marissa Streit,” Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow discussed how and why organizations like GDI and NewsGuard target conservative outlets such as his outlet.
“If they control our speech, if they censor information, if they censor education and news, they control everything,” she said. “They control the borders, they control education, they control the military. They control everything, because we don’t get to hear about what they’re doing.”
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) took the lead in negotiating the bill for Republicans, but the timing, contents, process, and other aspects of the deal have faced strong opposition from GOP members across the ideological spectrum. Johnson will likely need Democratic support to pass the bill under a suspension of the rules, which requires a two-thirds majority. This would allow him to bypass objections within his own party that could otherwise prevent the bill from passing. Government funding runs out on Friday.
Disclaimer: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author’s opinion.