Speech desk: Biden, the Mega Censor
Joe Biden made “more than 600” federal grants “to help curb speech considered by the U.S. government to be misinformation and disinformation,” report Gabe Kaminsky & Madeleine Rowley at The Free Press.
That drove Trump’s executive order directing “the Justice Department to work with other agencies to investigate” federal activities inconsistent with “Trump’s anti-censorship order.
“Powerful Republican lawmakers are now working with the Trump administration to identify” spending cuts. Yes, “the U.S. has funded many anti-disinformation initiatives aimed at repelling interference in U.S. elections by foreign adversaries such as Russia, China, and Iran.”
But those same initiatives have also been credibly “accused of unconstitutionally silencing speech, including theories about a lab leak causing Covid-19 and news reports on Hunter Biden’s laptop.”
Libertarian: The Hidden Economic Cost of Tariffs
President Trump’s habit of announcing new tariffs and then delaying them soon after is “not great” for people “who are trying to run businesses,” warns Reason’s Eric Boehm.
This week’s New York Fed monthly survey shows that manufacturers now “expect to see fewer orders, longer delivery times, declining inventories, and lower levels of employment” as well as higher prices.
To the hit of the tariffs themselves, add “the costs created by economic uncertainty,” now higher than it was even during the pandemic. The “most immediate impact may be a loss of economic dynamism, which means slower supply chains and reduced risk-taking, as businesses wait to see what the next pronouncement” from the president “will mean for their bottom lines.”
From the right: Harvard’s Free-Speech Lie
As Harvard resists the Trump administration’s demands, its “defenders” claim “academic freedom is at stake,” but these defenders want “the status quo of having academic freedom for some but not for others,” thunders Commentary’s Seth Mandel.
At Harvard, “Jews were told they could not keep their Hanukkah menorah up overnight because the school would not guarantee its safety,” and “Jewish and Israeli students have been repeatedly singled out, student organizations have placed exclusions on Jewish participation and identifiable Jews have been systematically attacked, harassed, and prevented from enjoying” the “free expression” granted “pro-Hamas mobs calling for death to the Jews.”
“That’s the status quo Harvard that its defenders seek to return to. Not a single one of them” wants “academic freedom.”
Foreign desk: Did Biden Fund Anti-Bibi Protests?
“The Biden State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development transferred tens of millions of dollars, directly and indirectly, to Israeli nongovernmental organizations working to topple the Netanyahu government,” notes Liel Leibovitz at The Wall Street Journal.
“Two House committees are investigating,” which is good, because “funding of foreign organizations can be a thorny thicket to navigate.” But “publicly available records” already “tell a suspicious story”: For example, Sikkuy-Aufoq, “a nonprofit working for ‘equality and partnership’ between Jews and Arabs,” got more than $1 million from 2021 to 2024 even as it “organized demonstrations and lawsuits” against Netanyahu’s government and policies.
That such “players in the anti-Netanyahu movement received American dollars suggests” something “more than coincidence” at play — “which is precisely why investigations are urgently needed.”
Migrant beat: Dems’ Folly in Championing Garcia
Though voters “give Trump the highest marks” on immigration, “Democrats have chosen” to make Kilmar Abrego Garcia “the face of Trump resistance,” marvels the Washington Examiner’s Conn Carroll.
“Garcia was not in the United States legally,” and a judge ordered him deported, though not to El Salvador. And though the Supreme Court acknowledged Team Trump erred in sending him there, it also instructed the District Court to clarify how to get him back.
Pressuring El Salvador is a “foreign policy” matter that “courts have no authority” over. Meanwhile, “after years” of letting in “murdering rapists,” Dems’ demand that Trump “move heaven and earth” to bring Garcia back “rings hollow.” Plus: “Garcia is exactly what Trump wants voters talking about while his tariffs tank the economy.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board