The State Department reportedly planned last month to move staff and funds from the controversial and now-closed Global Engagement Center to a new office aimed at countering “foreign information operations and interference.” Parliament was notified that this was the case.
The Global Engagement Center (GEC), which has come under fire from several House Republicans for promoting censorship of Americans, has been ostensibly shut down after members of Congress refused to reauthorize it in a recent spending bill. ceased operations on December 23rd.
This was revealed by Republican officials who reviewed the Biden administration's plan to respond to the GEC closure. washington examiner The agency appears to be merely “rebranding” and fears the new office will continue the same type of censorship work that the GEC was previously accused of doing, the agency said Thursday. stated.
“If the GEC’s powers are not extended; [State Department] “We plan to realign 51 staff members and associated funding from the GEC into a proposed Foreign Information Operations and Counter-Interference (R/FIMI) hub reporting directly to the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy (R/FIMI),” it said in a statement sent to members of Congress on December 6. This is stated in the notification. , according to the Washington Examiner.
Founded in 2016, GEC had a budget of approximately $61 million and a staff of 120 people.
Planning documents showed $29.4 million in GEC funds would be moved to the new office.
The letter states that remaining GEC staff and funding will be sent to the Africa Bureau, the East Asia and Pacific Bureau, the Europe and Eurasia Bureau, and other bureaus.
Plans to create a new “information operations” hub at the State Department are expected to trigger a congressional investigation, the newspaper reported.
“[President-elect] with donald trump [Secretary of State-designate] “If he wants to end the weaponization of the federal government against conservatives, Marco Rubio will need to go after every government agency, down to every employee,” a senior Republican aide said of the GEC shift. spoke.
“There are a lot of resistant Democrats at the State Department who think they got through the first Trump administration, and they think they'll get through the second one as well,” the aide added.
GEC was launched by journalist Matt Taibbi on US social media platforms in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, purporting to counter “disinformation” such as the theory that the virus escaped from a laboratory. embroiled in controversy after revealing evidence of pressure-based censorship of Americans online. China.
“Formal regulations for Twitter, Facebook, Google, and other companies to accept ‘requests’ for moderation from all corners of government, including the FBI, DHS, HHS, DOD, state Global Engagement Centers, and even the CIA.” ” Taibbi testified before Congress in March 2023, shortly after his “Twitter files” were exposed at the GEC.
later Washington Examiner not covered In 2021 and 2022, GEC will make a $100,000 grant to London-based media watchdog nonprofit Global Disinformation Index (GDI) to support 10 news organizations, including The Post. will be considered a provider of “false information.”
Several Republican members of Congress have argued that the GEC's efforts to censor Americans are going far beyond its stated mission to “aggressively combat efforts by foreign adversaries to undermine U.S. interests through disinformation and propaganda.” He claimed that it exceeded.
Elon Musk, who bought Twitter in 2022 over concerns about free speech, described GEC as “the worst offender of U.S. government censorship and media manipulation.”
The State Department did not immediately respond to The Post's request for comment on how the new Foreign Disinformation Bureau differs from the GEC.
