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The Supreme Court on Wednesday will hear arguments in a case to decide whether an Oklahoma Catholic school can participate in the state&#8217;s charter school program, pitting the school against the state&#8217;s Republican attorney general.
The controversy arose after the Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board approved a charter application from the Oklahoma City-based St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School. After taking office, Attorney General Gentner Drummond sued to block the school from being eligible for the program, saying that Oklahoma law mandated charter schools be &#8220;nonsectarian.&#8221;
The Oklahoma Supreme Court <a href="https://dm1l19z832j5m.cloudfront.net/2024-06/Drummond-v-OK-SVCSB-2024-06-25-Majority-Decision.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">agreed</a> with Drummond and blocked St. Isidore from receiving more public funds for its school. Represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, the charter board argues that St. Isidore&#8217;s First Amendment rights are being discriminated against.
“Instead of embracing schools like St. Isidore who are stepping up to provide solutions are discriminating against them just because of their faith,&#8221; charter board chair Brian Shellum said in a press call attended by The Daily Wire. &#8220;That’s not just unfair, it&#8217;s unconstitutional. Parents understand what’s at stake in this case. They are seeking results not roadblocks.&#8221;
Oklahoma charter schools, which are free and open to all students, are privately run but publicly supported.
In January, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case and will look at <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/qp/24-00394qp.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">two questions.</a> The first is &#8220;whether the academic and pedagogical choices of a privately owned and run school constitute state action simply because it contracts with the state to offer a free educational option for interested students.&#8221; The second is whether Oklahoma is violating the Free Exercise Clause by excluding St. Isidore.
A win for St. Isidore would strike down a provision of the Oklahoma Charter School Act that expressly forbids religious charter schools and could open the door for more religious charter schools across the country.
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&#8220;A ruling for Petitioners will promote parental choice, individual liberty, educational diversity, and student achievement. It will also improve the lives of economically disadvantaged families and children by creating high-quality educational opportunities that are currently out of their reach,&#8221; lawyers for Alliance Defending Freedom wrote in a <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24/24-394/356083/20250421111247727_24-394%20Reply%20Brief.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">brief</a>. &#8220;Excluding religious groups from Oklahoma’s charter-school program denies these opportunities and causes real harm. The Court should uphold the First Amendment and end this discrimination.&#8221;
Alliance Defending Freedom lawyer Jim Campbell pointed The Daily Wire to three recent Supreme Court cases — Trinity Lutheran v. Comer, Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, and Carson v. Makin — as examples of the high court siding with religious organizations that had been locked out of state programs. In Carson, the Supreme Court struck down a ban in Maine on vouchers from going toward religious schools.
Drummond also says that religious liberty is at stake, saying that it would be wrong to make the public fund religious schools that they are opposed to.
&#8220;As a committed Christian, the last thing I want is for my tax dollars to be used to fund the radical teachings of Sharia or the demonic worship of Satan. Thankfully, the Court agreed with my position and our religious liberty is protected — for now,&#8221; he said in July. &#8220;Let me be clear: Religious liberty means every citizen is free to worship as he or she believes. Religious liberty does not mean that the government should fund religious indoctrination with our tax dollars.&#8221;
He reiterated that argument in an <a href="https://www.oklahoman.com/story/opinion/2025/04/27/ag-st-isidore-schools-ok-would-threaten-religious-liberty-opinion/83193358007/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">op-ed</a> published on Monday in The Oklahoman, where he said that he supported religious private schools, but did not want the government to fund them in any form.
&#8220;I swore an oath to uphold the United States Constitution, and I believe our Founding Fathers knew best how to protect religious liberty: by preventing the government from funding any religion at all. I do not want Oklahoma schoolchildren indoctrinated in public schools — I want them educated,&#8221; he wrote.
A spokesman for Drummond told The Daily Wire that the op-ed summarized the heart of his arguments and pointed to <a href="https://oklahoma.gov/oag/news/generally-speaking/2024/july-a-triumph-for-religious-liberty.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">comments</a> he made after he won at the Oklahoma Supreme Court.
Other top Oklahoma GOP officials, including Governor Kevin Stitt and Oklahoma State School Superintendent Ryan Walters, disagree with Drummond.
&#8220;Oklahomans know the Bible and Christian values shaped our nation — and they’re tired of seeing faith driven out of our schools,&#8221; Walters said. &#8220;AG Drummond is out of step with Oklahoma conservatives who know what made America great.&#8221;
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Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court To Block Order To Return Mistakenly Deported Man

Supreme Court To Hear Arguments In Landmark Case On School Choice And Religious Liberty

Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF)

Catholic Church

Charter Schools

Education

Oklahoma

Religious Liberty

Supreme Court

A <a href="https://adfinternational.org/campaign/support-billboard-chris" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Canadian father</a> recently sat before an Australian tribunal in Melbourne for five days because he shared an article from <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13119521/Sex-secrets-trans-kinky-Australian-bondage-bestiality-nudism-drugs-sex-change.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Mail</a> in an X post last year.
Let that sink in.
Chris Elston, better known as &#8220;<a href="https://x.com/BillboardChris" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Billboard Chris</a>,&#8221; flew halfway around the world to defend not only his own free speech rights, but also those of all people. He is <a href="https://adfinternational.org/cases/billboard-chris-australia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">pushing back</a> against an order from Australia’s eSafety Commissioner. The order demanded X censor Chris’ February 2024 post criticizing the appointment of a transgender activist to a World Health Organization panel of experts, citing the Daily Mail <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13119521/Sex-secrets-trans-kinky-Australian-bondage-bestiality-nudism-drugs-sex-change.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">article</a> titled &#8220;Kinky secrets of UN trans expert REVEALED&#8221;
Linking to an article from one of the most-read news websites in the world, the post was <a href="https://x.com/Rob_ADFIntl/status/1906643539754205575" target="_blank" rel="noopener">deemed</a> by eSafety to be “cyber-abuse material targeted at an Australian adult.” X initially resisted pressure to censor the content in any way but later geo-blocked the post in Australia when hit with a formal takedown notice. Billboard Chris, with legal support from ADF International, is challenging that order, and X joined in a separate suit.
This isn’t about one post. It’s about whether governments should be able to censor lawful expression because they don’t like the content — in this case, the rejection of gender ideology. 
The hearing at the Melbourne Administrative Review Tribunal spanned five days and took in over 2,000 pages of documents. Meanwhile, the complainant, Teddy Cook, never even appeared before the tribunal.
<a href="https://x.com/Rob_ADFIntl/status/1906643539754205575" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Day one</a> revealed how thin the complaint truly was. eSafety’s lawyers claimed that part of the problem was that Chris had revealed Cook’s place of work and posted private images. Chris, however, simply reposted the Daily Mail’s piece, which named Cook’s workplace (a detail already publicly available online) and, as anyone who uses social media knows, the featured images were pulled from Daily Mail article, not supplied by Chris. It becomes more ridiculous still. The Daily Mail had obtained the photos from Cook’s own social media. The argument didn’t just collapse under scrutiny — it exposed the flimsy foundation apparently sufficient for this bureaucracy to suppress dissent.
By <a href="https://x.com/Rob_ADFIntl/status/1907084293513318811" target="_blank" rel="noopener">day two</a>, it was clear how detached from reality the process had become. There was no evidence of actual harm. Cook, just nine days after the post, had tweeted: “living my best life.” But here we were, with psychiatrists and professors flown in to dissect whether a single X post could legally be considered “likely … intended to have an effect of causing serious harm”.
Chris testified to the Tribunal about the issue at the core of his advocacy: “It’s damaging to teach children they are born in the wrong body &#8230; children are beautiful just as they are. No drugs or scalpels needed.” Asked whether he was trying to provoke outrage, he responded: “No. I want to provoke discussion.”
That matters. Under Australia’s Online Safety Act, takedown orders can only be issued if content is not only offensive, but also “likely …intended to have an effect of causing serious harm.&#8221; However, eSafety seemed to argue that intent is largely irrelevant. If someone feels offended, even by public information, that alone might justify censorship.
On <a href="https://x.com/Rob_ADFIntl/status/1907754476250792285" target="_blank" rel="noopener">days three and four</a>, several more expert witnesses took the stand. eSafety’s own expert — a digital communications professor — asserted that biologically accurate terms are “harmful,” and that children should be able to choose their gender around age 12. Note Australian taxpayers are footing the bill for this expertise — reportedly more than $10,000 for just this one.
The final day brought closing submissions and a stark contrast in worldviews. eSafety argued the Tribunal should view the post in isolation, ignoring the broader debate, and insisted that Teddy Cook — a WHO-appointed expert and activist — shouldn’t be considered a public figure. Chris’ legal team, along with X, pushed back: any fair assessment must consider the wider social and political context. This wasn’t targeted abuse — it was participation in a critical public conversation.
This case is a warning to all who value free expression. If a Canadian citizen can be silenced in Australia for sharing a news article on U.S.-based platform X, then clearly, censorship is no longer bound by borders. What’s to stop any other government — from Canada to the EU to China — from deciding your speech “harms” someone abroad and demanding it be taken down too?
This is exactly how global censorship metastasizes: bureaucracies leveraging international tech companies to enforce vague, ideological speech codes on people who never voted for them, under laws they never consented to. And the more they get away with it, the bolder they become.
Fortunately, X put up a robust legal defense, and Chris, with the legal backing of ADF International and the Human Rights Law Alliance, was unequivocal in his message: he will not be censored as he fights to put an end to the evils of gender ideology.
Most evidently, gender ideology needs censorship to survive, and that is why Chris has been targeted. He hasn’t gone before this tribunal to protect himself — he’s doing it to protect the right of every person to tell the truth.
This is a test case with global consequences. Billboard Chris’ censorship challenge shows us exactly where we’re headed if we don’t defend free speech: toward a world where bureaucrats silence opinions they don’t like, even from the other side of the globe. It’s a world where truth must be approved, and feelings outweigh facts. That’s not just anti-democratic — it’s dangerous. Because once a government crosses the line of international censorship, there’s no saying where it will stop.
* * *
Robert Clarke is a barrister and director of advocacy for ADF International, which is supporting the case of Billboard Chris in Australia. Follow him on X at <a href="https://x.com/Rob_ADFIntl?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rob_ADFIntl.</a>
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

MixCollage-07-Apr-2025-01-02-PM-8595

He Shared A Link On X. Now He’s In An Australian Court.

Australia

Canada

Free Speech

Gender

gender ideology

Opinion

Social Media Censorship

Twitter

After being a major part of a global network of companies that cracked down on conservative speech in the name of so-called misinformation, credit card giant Mastercard is committing that it will not make marketing or branding decisions based on third-parties, according to emails obtained by The Daily Wire. 
 The announcement comes after a group of investors represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom were prepping a resolution targeting the credit card company over its involvement with the Global Alliance for Responsible Media or GARM. Mastercard will release a new company policy in the coming months making clear that third-party views will not influence branding or marketing decisions, the company told the Alliance Defending Freedom this week.
GARM, which <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/leftist-censorship-cartel-garm-disbands-following-musk-lawsuit-ben-shapiro-testimony" target="_blank" rel="noopener">disbanded</a> in August 2024, a month after its leaders were<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-here-ben-shapiro-testifies-to-congress-on-censorship-updated-live"> called in to testify to Congress</a>, was an organization founded by the World Federation of Advertisers to ensure that companies only advertised with media outlets deemed “responsible.” In the name of this goal, GARM targeted podcasters like Joe Rogan, platforms like Elon Musk’s X, and conservative outlets like The Daily Wire, according to a congressional <a href="https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2024-07-10%20GARMs%20Harm%20-%20How%20the%20Worlds%20Biggest%20Brands%20Seek%20to%20Control%20Online%20Speech.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">investigation</a>. The Daily Wire&#8217;s Editor Emeritus Ben Shapiro testified that the aim of the advertising coalition was to &#8220;throttle viewpoints&#8221; that Democrat legislators and the Biden administration did not like.
After meetings with Alliance Defending Freedom lawyers, Mastercard, which was on the board of the World Federation of Advertisers that oversaw GARM, now says that it alone will determine its marketing and branding strategy. 
“We advance our marketing priorities with a close eye on the value delivered to our brand, the interest and relevance to the intended audience, and whether the media channel/platform supports our ability to deliver new and unique experiences to the end consumer,” a copy of the policy viewed by The Daily Wire says. “Mastercard alone makes decisions on our brand and our marketing activities, independent of any third-party views.”
That came after Inspire Investing, a Christian investment company represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, met with Mastercard to discuss a proposed shareholder resolution to call for an investigation over Mastercard’s involvement with GARM. 
A draft of the resolution viewed by The Daily Wire called for Mastercard to evaluate “how it oversees risks related to discrimination against ad buyers and sellers based on their political or religious status or views.”
After Mastercard agreed to distance itself from third-party organizations, Inspire Investing and Alliance Defending Freedom agreed to withdraw the resolution. 
“This is a meaningful step forward for Mastercard,” Inspire Investing Director of Corporate Engagement Tim Schwarzenberger told The Daily Wire. “We appreciate Mastercard’s willingness to engage with shareholders and make this important commitment to making decisions independent of third-party influences. It’s a positive step for free speech, religious freedom, and ultimately for all Mastercard stakeholders.”
After publication of this story, a Mastercard spokesman told The Daily Wire that the policy &#8220;reinforced our long-standing practices related to decision making on our marketing activities&#8221; in &#8220;conversations related to this proposal.&#8221;
The spokesman also attempted to distance the credit card company from GARM, saying, &#8220;While two members of our marketing team had participated in separate working groups, they were not aware of specific GARM plans or coordinated activities.&#8221;
Mastercard&#8217;s Chief Marketing and Communications Officer, Raja Rajamannar, who served as president of the World Federation of Advertisers while GARM was in operation, and regularly touted the work of GARM as a positive step for the advertising industry. In a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPJ8OmWwhN8&amp;t=90s">video posted to a Mastercard YouTube channel</a>, Rajamannar urged &#8220;every CMO&#8221; to join GARM.
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Call for Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM)" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oPJ8OmWwhN8?start=90&#038;feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Jeremy Tedesco, the senior vice President of corporate engagement at Alliance Defending Freedom, said the new policy from Mastercard represented a major win for conservative customers.
“MasterCard, their business purpose is to make sure that people can transact funds. And that&#8217;s it. And that’s what they should be doing,” he told The Daily Wire. “They shouldn’t be taking their ad buying power and trying to shut down people they disagree with in the marketplace of ideas.”
He also said that it was a necessary step to hold companies accountable that supported the censorship of conservatives. 
“They used their ad buying power in collaboration with other major corporations to suppress conservative and religious content online,” he told The Daily Wire. “It’s really critical that these companies are held accountable for collaborating in that way, in collaborating with people who want to stop so-called misinformation and hate speech from appearing on the internet.”
He said that Alliance Defending Freedom has filed over 70 shareholder resolutions, had over 50 meetings with corporate leaders, and obtained 13 policy behavior changes this corporate season.
This piece has been updated to include comment from Mastercard and additional context.

Mastercard Credit Card

Mastercard, Facing Pressure Over Role In Global Censorship Effort, Agrees To Major Change

Censorship

credit card

GARM

Mastercard

Planned Parenthood shouldn’t receive one cent of Americans’ taxpayer dollars. That’s the central truth at the heart of a landmark case the U.S. Supreme Court will hear on April 2, <a href="https://adflegal.org/case/medina-v-planned-parenthood-south-atlantic/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic</a>. The incredibly flawed and corrupt abortion industry is a sham of women’s true health care.
I know. I used to work in an abortion facility.
Before my eyes were opened to the truth of life in the womb and the unspeakable harms abortion inflicts on both child and mother, I was a medical assistant at an abortion facility in Illinois. The doctors would perform between 40-60 abortions a day, six days a week. We had between five to eight minutes to get a woman on the table for her procedure and then move her quickly to the next room so doctors could perform the next abortion.
It was a fast-moving train of patient to patient to patient. If you didn’t have the girl ready when the doctor came in, you were slowing him down. He’d write you up, and that would go into your employment file. It was very important to move quickly so the doctors could perform as many abortions as possible, up to 10 additional each day.
One former Planned Parenthood nurse recently remarked on the fast pace of abortion facilities. She shared her own experience in a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/15/us/planned-parenthood-clinics.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New York Times article</a>: “Employees sometimes administered expired pain medication or the wrong medications as they scrambled to move people in and out.” She added, “It was not uncommon for patients to be taken to the wrong room and prepped for the wrong procedure.”
All of that is deeply disturbing, but unfortunately, it doesn’t surprise me. The focus of the industry that loudly touts “women’s health care” is on one thing: Money. And abortion is big money. In fact, it is the most significant driving factor in the abortion industry.
Between 2018 and 2023, Planned Parenthood (the largest abortion provider in the U.S.) <a href="https://www.plannedparenthood.org/uploads/filer_public/ce/f6/cef6efdb-919a-4211-bb5c-ce0d61fda7f5/2024-ppfa-annualreport-c3-digital.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">received</a> $3.2 billion in direct public funding. Each year, it receives hundreds of millions more from private donors. Since 2022, it has experienced a fundraising boom, amassing over $2.5 billion in net assets.
But its supporters are being deceived into believing big abortion equals comprehensive care for women. Planned Parenthood takes donors’ money and spends it on political activism, not people, and certainly not women’s health care.
The aforementioned New York Times article reported that, over the last five years, “the national office has distributed more than $899 million to affiliates to help them deliver care, but none of it went directly to medical services.” Much of the money went instead to pro-abortion politicking, legal costs, and marketing.
Between 2022 and 2023, women’s preventative-care visits <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/more-abortions-more-taxpayer-dollars-and-fewer-health-services/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fell by 31%</a>, and the number of patients seen annually <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/15/us/planned-parenthood-clinics.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">has fallen 60% since the 1990s</a>. <a href="https://lozierinstitute.org/fact-sheet-planned-parenthoods-2022-23-annual-report/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Cancer screening and prevention services</a> have dropped by 71% since 2010, including declines of 72% for breast exams and 74% for pap tests.
Americans should never be forced to fund any activist organization, much less one with such an abysmal and deceptive track record, especially when the <a href="https://www.kofc.org/en/news-room/polls/americans-support-legal-limits-on-abortion.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">majority of Americans</a> reject taxpayer funding for abortion.
The state of South Carolina agreed. It rightly determined that Planned Parenthood doesn’t qualify as a health care provider that should receive Medicaid dollars. In response, Planned Parenthood sued the state, and now the nation’s highest court is weighing this <a href="https://adflegal.org/campaign/medina/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped" target="_blank" rel="noopener">critical case</a>.
States should be free to direct their funding to providers offering genuine, comprehensive health care by excluding organizations like Planned Parenthood—whose primary business is abortion—from public funding. There are roughly 200 publicly funded health care clinics in South Carolina that provide a broad range of high-quality services, including family-planning services. Consider also the numerous pregnancy centers offering valuable, free services to women in need.
It’s been my great honor to have seen firsthand these service-oriented organizations at work in their communities.
For nearly four decades, I’ve worked at Mosaic Health, a pregnancy center with two locations in Illinois. We’ve served more than 25,000 clients by offering no-cost pregnancy testing and ultrasounds, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, post-abortion counseling, adoption referrals, parenting classes, and a wide array of practical resources for new parents, from diapers to clothes to bottles.
Yet the state of Illinois works diligently to force us to close our doors. Current state law specifically targets pregnancy centers like Mosaic because of our fundamentally held belief that abortion offers no benefits, especially to the unborn baby. Because the U.S. Supreme Court <a href="https://adflegal.org/press-release/us-supreme-court-govt-cant-force-americans-express-messages-they-disagree/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped">held</a> that forcing people to promote abortion is unconstitutional, we’ve partnered with Alliance Defending Freedom and other Illinois pregnancy centers to <a href="https://adflegal.org/case/national-institute-family-and-life-advocates-v-treto/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped">challenge</a> this unconstitutional law. I, along with many others across our state, pray the district court will see the law’s injustice and uphold our freedom as a pregnancy center to operate according to our deeply held beliefs.
But I’m also looking to the U.S. Supreme Court as they weigh the Medina case, hoping they will agree with the ADF attorneys representing South Carolina and find that states should be free to spend their funds on true, comprehensive, life-affirming health care for women and children.
* * *
Kathy Lesnoff is the president and CEO of Mosaic Health in Illinois.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Conservatives Gather For Annual CPAC Conference In Washington DC

Money, Not Women’s Health, Drives The Abortion Industry

Abortion

Federal Government

Funding

Money

Planned Parenthood

Working in corporate engagement, I often hear questions about why the ‘long game’ matters in changing woke company policies. If executive orders can instantly push companies away from DEI or ESG initiatives, why take other pathways? The answer is clear: lasting change takes time. JPMorgan Chase, the nation’s largest bank, just proved this with a major policy shift — one that speaks louder than any theory ever could.
In 2022, JPMorgan Chase <a href="https://nypost.com/2025/03/10/opinion/i-was-debanked-by-jpmorgan-chase-but-fought-back-and-won/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">debanked</a> former U.S. Senator and Ambassador Sam Brownback, after Brownback opened an account for the newly-formed National Committee for Religious Freedom. The son of a Kansas farmer, Brownback refused to back down. When Brownback asked the bank for its rationale in shuttering his account, he was met with conflicting (and incorrect) explanations as to why.
Brownback’s debanking experience was the start of a major wave of scrutiny over exactly what conditions a bank will close a customer’s account. Victims range from nonprofit organizations like Indigenous Advance, an organization serving Ugandan widows &amp; orphans debanked by Bank of America in 2023, to Melania &amp; Barron Trump, who Melania <a href="https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/2025-01-24-Letter.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">described</a> as having been debanked in her memoir, prompting further inquiry from the House Committee on Oversight.
Yet JPMorgan consistently ranked as one of the major bad actors in the debanking saga, closing not only Brownback’s account (and actually <a href="https://www.ag.ky.gov/Press%20Release%20Attachments/23.5.2%20Letter%20to%20Chase.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">asked</a> for his org’s donor list for restoring service) but several other conservative nonprofits. The biggest bank in America was quickly racking up hits on its record of political neutrality and customer equality.
This trend might have gone unaddressed had the Right simply let the issue lie. Luckily, some of the most influential names in both the conservative legal, financial, and government worlds stepped up to the plate. Pressure for increased transparency and commitments to ditch any policies that could lead to a client being debanked for political reasons has come from all directions, from legal giants like <a href="https://adfmedia.org/press-release/19-states-chase-stop-misleading-customers-commit-equality-treatment/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alliance Defending Freedom</a> to <a href="https://www.viewpointdiversityscore.org/news/statement-on-debanking-and-free-speech" target="_blank" rel="noopener">notable financial professionals</a> to <a href="https://www.ag.ky.gov/Press%20Release%20Attachments/23.5.2%20Letter%20to%20Chase.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">state financial officers and attorneys general</a>. As that public pressure mounted, shareholder pressure has been growing from the inside for the past three years, spurred on by organizations like the firm I work for, Bowyer Research, with Chase investors like financial advisor David Bahnsen spending literal years <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/bahnsen-takes-the-fight-today-to-jpmorgan-chase/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">urging</a> the company to clarify its approach to debanking — and fix its spotty track record on political neutrality.
And Chase listened.
In 2023, JPMorgan made the decision to axe its “social risk” policy from its payment processing arm, no longer allowing vague terms like “intolerance” and “hate” to determine whether a customer was fit to continue doing business at Chase. But the biggest win so far came several days ago, when Chase agreed to a policy change explicitly protecting customers and employees from discrimination based on religious or political views.
This is huge. Many stories about companies ditching woke policies consist of the company putting out a public statement (and often the controversy that follows). Statements are great, but they’re not the ideal. Companies can hide behind statements — and do. Several companies that have publicly made statements supporting political neutrality clearly have work to do when it comes to actually putting their policies where their mouths are.
But companies can’t hide behind policy changes. That’s why they’re a sign of both real progress and good faith. Shareholders like Bahnsen, and groups like ADF &amp; Bowyer Research, have been engaging with Chase for years to get this change. Make no mistake: Chase’s willingness to protect against future political/religious debanking is the result of real shareholders using real influence to create real change. It’s a victory for Chase’s customers and shareholders, but also for the company itself. It’s a win for a company to clear up concerns about corporate bias, a win that’s been a long time coming, and a win that hopefully many other banks will find instructive.
* * *
Isaac Willour is an award-winning journalist focusing on race, culture, and American conservatism, as well as a corporate relations analyst at Bowyer Research. His work has been featured at outlets including USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times Opinion, C-SPAN, and The Daily Wire. He is a member of the Young Voices contributor program and can be found on X <a href="https://twitter.com/IsaacWillour" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@IsaacWillour</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Major US Bank Bosses To Discuss Debanking With Senate Committee

Major Win: JPMorgan Chase Ends Political Debanking

Banking

Banks

Bias

Christians

Conservatives

Corporations

debanking

Jamie Dimon

JP Morgan

Woke Culture

The Alliance Defending Freedom is demanding answers from the federal government about the Biden administration&#8217;s weaponization of government against conservatives as part of its push to combat alleged domestic extremism. 
On Monday, ADF filed Freedom of Information Act requests with the Treasury Department, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security about their work to combat so-called extremism under President Joe Biden. ADF believes that the information gleaned from the requests will shed greater light on how the Biden administration ordered banks to spy on the financial records of conservative Americans. 
“We sent these requests based on the belief that big banks and Big Tech are just as threatening to freedom as big brother,” Alliance Defending Freedom legal counsel Mercer Martin told The Daily Wire. “We have been going through the mounting evidence that the government, through these organizations, was enlisting big business and banks in its censorship schemes.” 
The FOIA request focuses largely on two aspects of the government’s actions under Biden.
First, ADF wants to know more about how the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) flagged conservative-coded transactions for potential investigation. Second, ADF wants to know the nature of the government’s work with private organizations, to identify domestic extremism and target so-called misinformation. 
Overall, Martin said the is was to identify how the Biden administration worked to “outsource censorship to private organizations and businesses.&#8221;
The FOIAs filed with the Treasury Department seek information on FinCEN’s “relationship with private organizations purportedly to combat domestic violent extremism” and “the government’s warrantless surveillance of Americans’ private financial information.”
It was previously <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/feds-flagged-terms-like-trump-maga-for-banks-to-comb-through-customer-data-jordan-says" target="_blank" rel="noopener">revealed</a> that top officials at FinCEN ordered banks to comb through customer data if terms like “TRUMP” or “MAGA” were used in transactions. Banks were also provided to provide information if customers had purchased religious texts or subscriptions to “extremist” media outlets. 
ADF’s requests would require the Treasury Department to provide documents and communications with key words like “Christian,” “Catholic,” “radical traditional,” “Southern Poverty Law Center,” “capitol riot,” and January 6. 
The FOIAs also asked for communications between the Treasury Department and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, an organization that labeled ADF a “hate group” in a report that was linked to by FinCEN. 
ADF’s FOIAs of the FBI seek information on the any documents related to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a far-Left organization the bureau <a href="https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2023-12-04-the-fbis-breach-of-religious-freedom-the-weaponization-of-law-enforcement-against-catholic-americans.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cited</a> in a memo warning about the radical about “radical-traditional Catholic” ideology
“The reason we’re interested in their work with the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue is that [the government was] using those organizations’ lists of so-called hate groups or targeted groups, they were using those lists to then encourage banks and financial organizations to target their customers based on those lists,” Martin told The Daily Wire. 
The FOIAs also request information on the FBI’s work with the Domestic Security Alliance Council to “collect Americans’ personal financial information from private financial institutions and encourage private financial institutions to monitor Americans’ financial activity.”
The Domestic Security Alliance is a public-private partnership that purportedly <a href="https://www.dsac.gov/about">exists</a> to promote “the timely and effective exchange of security and intelligence information between the federal government and the private sector.”
In a third FOIA to the FBI, ADF requested that the bureau provide any communications with key words like “disinformation,” “election integrity,” “election interference,” “hate speech,” or “lab leak” and Big Tech companies like Google, Instagram, Facebook, and others. 
Along similar lines, the request to the DHS ask for documents on its work to combat alleged domestic extremism with private organizations and the flagging of Americans’ banking transactions. 
Martin said that the goal of the requests was to bring accountability to the government and determine whether individuals’ constitutional rights had been violated. 
“If we find that the Biden administration was violating individuals constitutional rights, we are interested in taking action to vindicate those rights as well,” he said.

President Biden Addresses NAACP Convention In Las Vegas

EXCLUSIVE: Alliance Defending Freedom Demands Answers On Biden Admin Censorship

Biden Administration

Department of Homeland Security

Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)

Treasury Department

The Supreme Court will hear a challenge to a Colorado law that has been called the state&#8217;s so-called &#8220;conversion therapy&#8221; ban. 
The case was brought by the Alliance Defending Freedom on behalf of private Colorado Springs counselor Kaley Chiles, who says the law violates her First Amendment rights to free speech. Passed in 2019, the law <a href="https://leg.colorado.gov/sites/default/files/2019a_1129_signed.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">prohibits</a> counseling that “attempts or purports to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity.”
“Many of my clients chose to work with me because we share a similar perspective on faith and values,” Chiles said during a press call on Wednesday morning. “However, I&#8217;m facing a serious challenge. Colorado’s counseling censorship law threatens my ability to engage in private, professional conversations with my clients.” 
Chiles added that the law pushes children with gender dysphoria “toward harmful medical interventions” while not allowing counselors to help those who may want to detransition. 
Penalties for violating the law include a fine of up to $5000 and professional disciplinary action that could include loss of one’s counseling license. 
“We’re very grateful that the U.S. Supreme Court decided to hear this very important case. It’s essential that children and parents have access to safe and effective counseling that meets their needs and that avoids dangerous and experimental medical interventions,” ADF lawyer Jim Campbell said. 
Campbell added that Chiles has been forced to turn away multiple clients over the law. 
“Colorado censors Kaley from speaking words her clients want to hear because the government does not like the views she expresses,” he added. “Government officials may not impose their ideology on private conversations between counselors and their clients.”
Colorado’s law was previously upheld by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals while the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down similar laws implemented by cities in Florida. The Supreme Court is expected to hear arguments on the Colorado law in October. 
The Supreme Court is also poised to rule this summer on another transgender-related case. In December, the court heard a challenge to a Tennessee law banning transgender medical procedures on children. Analysts believe that the justices will uphold that law after the conservative-leaning court appeared largely skeptical of the challenge.

8th Anniversary Of Supreme Court’s Obergefell Decision Legalizing Gay Marriage In The United States

SCOTUS To Hear Challenge To Colorado’s Gender Identity ‘Censorship Law’

Colorado

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First Amendment

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Ten scientists filed their opening demand against a major academic publisher after they say it retracted their work exposing the dangers of the abortion pill for political reasons.
In a recently filed <a href="https://assaultonscience.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2025/02/2025.02.21-SvS-Arbitration-Demand_Redacted.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">arbitration demand</a>, ten Charlotte Lozier-affiliated scholars say that Sage Publications discriminated against them and violated its contractual obligations when it retracted three of their studies, including two on the abortion drug Mifepristone. They want a judge to rule that the retractions were erroneous and that they were discriminated against based on their beliefs.
One of the now-retracted <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23333928211053965" target="_blank" rel="noopener">studies</a>, published November 9, 2021, found that the rate of emergency room visits following chemical abortions had spiked 500% from 2002-2015, according to Medicaid claims data. Another one of the studies, published May 20, 2022, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23333928221103107" target="_blank" rel="noopener">analyzed the likelihood</a> of recurring emergency room visits for women who did not disclose to doctors that they had a chemical abortion.
These two studies were <a href="https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.txnd.370067/gov.uscourts.txnd.370067.137.0_19.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cited</a> in Federal Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk’s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/federal-judge-in-texas-suspends-fda-approval-of-abortion-pill-used-in-up-to-half-of-abortions" target="_blank" rel="noopener">decision</a> to suspend FDA approval of mifepristone.
“Sage’s reasons for retracting the Articles were pretextual. Sage did not point to anything that could justify the rare and severe measure of retraction under prevailing professional guidelines, such as a major error or falsification,” the scholars&#8217; opening arbitration demand filed by lawyers with the Alliance Defending Freedom and Consovoy McCarthy says.
The February 2024 retractions, which occurred weeks before the Supreme Court heard arguments on the availability of abortion pills, were <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/completely-unjustified-medical-journal-retracts-major-studies-critical-of-abortion-pill-ahead-of-supreme-court-clash">first reported</a> by The Daily Wire.
The lawyers argue that Sage breached its contract with the scholars, was guilty of negligence, and violated California&#8217;s civil rights law.
“The combined reputational and economic harm to the Authors from these unlawful actions is enormous and incalculable,” the filing adds. “Because of Sage’s retractions, the Authors and their research have been attacked by the media, by other authors, and even by a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, and the Authors have had new research proposals inexplicably turned away by other journals that now fear associating with them. The Authors have years—even decades—of fruitful research ahead of them, but they are now being treated as pariahs.”
Dr. James Studnicki, one of the authors on the papers, was also kicked off the editorial board of Sage’s Health Services Research and Managerial Epidemiology journal, months before the retractions actually took place. The filing says that this was done for discriminatory purposes.
For resolution, the scholars say that a judge should rule that the scholars and Studnicki were discriminated against, that Sage violated its contractual agreement, a declaration that the retractions were erroneous, and monetary damages.
The scholars first filed their lawsuit against Sage in October 2024 in California. Sage did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Appeals Court Keeps Abortion Pill Mifepristone Available, But With Restrictions

Scholars Continue Fight Against Journal Over Retraction Of Studies Showing Danger Of Abortion Pill

Abortion Drug

Academia

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Social Issues

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“There is a Passion natural to the Mind of man, especially a free Man, which renders him impatient of Restraint.” — George Mason
“If I were king, I would not allow people to go around burning the American flag. However, we have a First Amendment which says that the right of free speech shall not be abridged — and it is addressed in particular to speech critical of the government. That was the main kind of speech that tyrants would seek to suppress.” — Justice Antonin Scalia
* * *
We are both third-year law students at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University and we recently experienced speech suppression by university officials that completely goes against the spirit of the two figures our school represents. We objected to the idea of men in women’s restrooms — and vice versa. Fortunately, after we filed a <a href="https://adflegal.org/case/cerankosky-v-washington/?utm_source=dailywire&amp;utm_medium=oped" target="_blank" rel="noopener">lawsuit</a> with the help of Alliance Defending Freedom, our school quickly reversed course and has revised the policy used against us.
We are both part of a “Scalia Law ‘25” GroupMe discussion board for students in our graduating class, and late last September, a fellow third-year law student notified the group that he had been chosen as the official law school student representative for the Graduate and Professional Studies Assembly (GAPSA). He noted that GAPSA reports to the GMU administration, promised to do his best to advocate for all law students, and informed us that he had already shared some “concerns.”
One of the “concerns” he shared with GAPSA was a proposal to add feminine hygiene products to all restrooms “regardless of gender marker.” This, of course, implies a belief that one’s sense of “gender identity” is subjective, meaning that men could access women’s restrooms. We were immediately concerned for our personal safety and found that this proposal conflicted with our religious beliefs. The proposal put forward by the other student had the opposite effect of his promise to alleviate our concerns and advocate for us.
At the end of his post, the student asked if there was anything we would like to address. We voiced our opinions, highlighting our privacy and safety concerns with his proposal. Other students agreed by “liking” our posts. We also pointed out that conservative students have just as much of a right to be represented as everyone else. Despite soliciting our concerns and promising to represent all students to GAPSA, this student responded by mocking our opinions, condescending that it wasn’t any of our “business what gender someone identifies with.” While he mocked our beliefs, we respectfully responded that, as women, it is absolutely our business if men have access to our restrooms.
Two weeks later, the university’s Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion slapped us with no-contact orders prohibiting us from having any communication with the student.
We weren’t notified that the student had complained to the DEI Office, nor were we warned that we could potentially receive no-contact orders. Under GMU’s <a href="https://adfmedialegalfiles.blob.core.windows.net/files/CerankoskyExhibits1to12.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Title IX policy</a> at that time, the orders applied both on- and off-campus and remained in place until the DEI Office — in its sole discretion — rescinded them.
When we expressed our concerns with school officials, they tried to <a href="https://adfmedialegalfiles.blob.core.windows.net/files/CerankoskyExhibits1to12.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shrug</a> it off by saying the orders were not “disciplinary” and were reciprocal, meaning the other student has no-contact orders with us. When we raised the issue that these orders suppressed our free speech, the school told us we’re allowed to have our opinions; the no-contact orders are a result of the “effect” of our speech.
They tried to convince us that there’s a difference — but if we must tiptoe around sharing our opinions because others may disagree, that chills our speech and violates our constitutional rights. With those orders, we faced expulsion from the school if the student alleged a violation of the orders. There are even state bar exams that ask if we have faced any sort of disciplinary action while at school.
As such, we decided to file a lawsuit against the school, and GMU did the right thing and settled the case with us. Officials lifted the no-contact orders, ensured that these kinds of orders would not be used to suppress speech — now giving our school one of the best policies in the country. We also received financial compensation.
Universities and law schools should be vibrant centers in the marketplace of ideas. GMU is right to change its policy to uphold the vision of its namesake that respects the rights of all students.
* * *
Selene Cerankosky and Maria Arcara are third-year law students at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Statue of George Mason on campus of George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia

We Took A Stand For Biological Truth At Our University — And Won

American Universities

Bathrooms

Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI)

Gender Identity

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Title IX

Virginia

A decade ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook gave a stirring convocation address to the graduating class of George Washington University.
“The sidelines are not where you want to live your life,” Cook said. “The world needs you in the arena. There are problems that need to be solved. Injustices that need to be ended.”
Cook’s message was right but was missed by conservative shareholders, who for far too long sat on the sidelines while activists on the far-Left, like the radical Human Rights Campaign, Engine No. 1, and As You Sow, have staged a hostile takeover of Corporate America.
In the process, seemingly invincible brands like Bud Light, Target, and Disney bent the knee to these activists and ended up losing billions of dollars in value. Worse, a host of once-cherished American brands have been hijacked, transformed into tools wielded by ideologically driven forces. These actors pursue agendas that clash head-on with the core beliefs of the companies’ own shareholders, as well as the bedrock principles of free markets and constitutional liberties that define our nation.
That’s a problem. One might even call it an injustice that needs to be ended.
Your rights as a shareholder in many ways mirror your rights as a citizen. Like elected officials in Washington, D.C., or your state capital are accountable to their voters, leaders of publicly traded companies answer to their shareholders. That includes major stockholders like Cook, but also everyday Americans who invest in a variety of ways, including through a 401(k) or other investment products. So, just like at the ballot box, your vote matters at the annual shareholder meetings of the companies you own.
Yet, unlike the political process, many Americans simply don’t exercise their voting rights as shareholders. Instead, they delegate that right to activist investment or proxy advisors who often vote against their values. Like a football game where only one team takes the field, the score is as lopsided as you would expect.
Fringe groups pushing extreme ideas understand this all too well. Take the HRC’s current requirement that companies must pay for life-altering and experimental puberty-blocking drugs and cross-sex hormones for children as part of their healthcare plan to earn a coveted 100% on the so-called “Corporate Equality Index.”
The HRC <a href="https://reports.hrc.org/corporate-equality-index-2025" target="_blank" rel="noopener">touts</a> 765 businesses — including Apple — that bow to this demand, but it couldn’t be further out of step with most shareholders. Nearly 7 in 10 Americans <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/05/05/trans-poll-gop-politics-laws/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">oppose</a> puberty blockers for young children and the U.S. Supreme Court is currently <a href="https://adflegal.org/press-release/supreme-court-decide-whether-states-can-protect-children-experimental-medical/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">considering</a> whether to uphold a Tennessee law protecting children from this practice, with similar laws in a total of 27 states likely affected by the decision.
Thankfully, shareholders who represent mainstream American values are finally taking Cook’s advice and getting in the game. Working with dozens of values-aligned investors, financial advisors, corporate engagement advisors, and state financial officers that together represent over $250 billion in assets under management, Alliance Defending Freedom and Inspire Investing are leading the charge with a coalition that has filed over 68 shareholder resolutions at over 50 corporations this year alone.
For the first time, we are setting the agenda for corporate America. And that’s clearest to see at Cook’s Apple, where all four resolutions on the proxy ballot for the company’s Feb. 25 annual meeting come from our values-aligned shareholder allies.
Inspire Investing filed a resolution calling on Apple executives to report to their shareholders the impact of partnering with divisive groups like the HRC and the <a href="https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/03/the-southern-poverty-law-center-is-everything-thats-wrong-with-liberalism" target="_blank" rel="noopener">highly discredited</a> Southern Poverty Law Center, which played a <a href="https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2023-12-04-the-fbis-breach-of-religious-freedom-the-weaponization-of-law-enforcement-against-catholic-americans.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">prominent</a> role in the FBI’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&amp;v=aEyd3ErNZ04" target="_blank" rel="noopener">targeting</a> of Roman Catholics and parents protecting their kids by speaking out at school board meetings during the previous administration.
Other resolutions include a call for transparency on ethical AI data collection and usage, as well as a directive for Apple to stop discriminating against employees under the financially and legally risky banner of DEI policies from the National Center for Public Policy Research. Meanwhile, Bowyer Research worked with the American Family Association to <a href="https://wng.org/opinions/forbidden-fruit-1739862491">file</a> a proposal asking Apple leadership to explain why it removed an iOS software function designed to identify child sex abuse material — a decision that has led company leaders to admit Apple has become “the greatest platform for distributing child porn, etc.”
Apple should at least see the merit in this proposal, but instead, they are pushing shareholders to reject it — and even tried to dodge accountability altogether by begging the SEC to keep it off their proxy statement. The SEC said no, thanks to ADF’s intervention.
A decade ago, Tim Cook told graduates, “There are problems that need to be solved. Injustices that need to be ended.” Today, the injustice lies in Apple and other corporate giants ignoring shareholders, aligning with divisive groups, and silencing dissent — all while straying from the values that built them.
Freedom and free market loving shareholders are done watching from the sidelines. We’re in the arena now, holding Cook and his peers to their own call: end the injustices, starting with providing accountability to your shareholders.
* * *
Jeremy Tedesco (@Jeremy_Tedesco) is senior counsel, senior vice president of corporate engagement at <a href="http://www.adflegal.org/?utm_source=wallstreetjournal&amp;utm_medium=oped" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Alliance Defending Freedom</a> (<a href="https://twitter.com/ADFLegal">@ADFLegal</a>). 
Robert Netzly (@RobertNetzly) is CEO of Inspire Investing (@InspireAdvisor).
The views expressed in this piece are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Apple Holds Annual Worldwide Developers Conference

How Conservative Shareholders Earned A Seat At The Corporate Table

Apple

Human Rights Campaign

Silicon Valley

Since Churchill’s time, America and Britain have spoken of their “special relationship” – even if the affection has been somewhat unilateral in recent years, as the US has recognised the UK’s increasing irrelevance on the world stage as it descends into economic decay, social disintegration, and democratic suppression.
You might think this an exaggeration – and I do not intend to imply that dissenting British voices receive the same treatment they might receive in China or Cuba. But that is not the right question. The question is whether dissenting voices in Britain are free.
We have all seen the evidence that they are not. The first act of Bridget Philipson, Keir Starmer’s Education Secretary, was to <a href="https://freespeechunion.org/phillipson-tried-to-pull-plug-on-new-free-speech-law-days-after-election/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">try and revoke</a> the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act, even after it was passed by Parliament. That this is not merely a position, but even the top priority, of our new government is chilling. This, despite the fact that <a href="https://adfinternational.org/en-gb/news/uk-students-feel-censored-on-campus-poll-finds" target="_blank" rel="noopener">nearly half</a> of UK students are scared to express their views.
Whether people are <a href="https://www.gbnews.com/news/christian-lecturer-sacked-from-methodist-college" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fired from their jobs</a>, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-derbyshire-64786856" target="_blank" rel="noopener">referred to terrorist watchlists</a>, secretly put on registers for “non-crime hate incidents” (<a href="https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/children-as-young-as-nine-investigated-by-police-for-hate-incidents/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">even as children</a>), or even <a href="https://www.thetimes.com/article/police-criticised-over-arrest-for-gay-swastika-post-0dj6j0007">arrested</a>, freedom of speech is increasingly a luxury commodity in Britain – and saying what you think is increasingly seen as criminal. “Hate speech” is increasingly seen as a legitimate constraint – with <a href="https://premierchristian.news/en/news/article/bible-hate-speech-survey-rewrite" target="_blank" rel="noopener">1 in 4 young people</a> open to banning the Bible itself if they believed it included “hate speech”.
Yet free speech is not the only casualty of recent years. Multiple people have been <a href="https://adfinternational.org/en-gb/cases/isabel" target="_blank" rel="noopener">arrested or charged</a> merely for praying silently in their heads in the vicinity of an abortion clinic (which, in one case, was not even open), with an army veteran <a href="https://adfinternational.org/en-gb/news/guilty-army-vet-convicted-for-praying-silently-near-abortion-facility" target="_blank" rel="noopener">recently convicted</a> for silently praying for his unborn son. Thoughtcrime is no longer Orwellian fiction.
When asked if the UK should be included among other human rights abusing regimes, however, congressmen in the US ordinarily reply that “we are allies, we can’t do that”. The UK is enough of a friend to the US that it escapes any significant accountability.
But true friends do not let each other make serious mistakes without challenge: that is politeness, not friendship. So the question is: can the UK be enough of a friend to receive accountability?
We all know what tough love means: that if you really seek the best for someone, you confront them with reality, whose content or consequences may be acutely painful – but ultimately needed for our flourishing. And the reality in this case is clear: the British people desperately need a restoration of their civil liberties before we are too far down the slippery slope. If the US really cares for our country and its citizens, you must speak – and act – in favor of our freedom, whoever you offend in the process. Vance’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCOsgfINdKg" target="_blank" rel="noopener">speech in Munich</a> was a fantastic start – but now action is needed.
There are many ways to achieve this, but here is one idea: the freedom tariff. The UK is desperate for a trade deal with the US after Brexit. Trade is one of the few areas where nations can be genuinely held accountable beyond stern letters or phone calls – which are routinely ignored. Freedom tariffs would provide genuine leverage over the UK with a simple addition: include a clause stipulating that insofar as the UK restricts the most basic freedoms – speech, assembly, conscience, religion, and thought – it will pay for those restrictions with tariffs.
This is hardly coercive: why should America give us free trade when we won’t give our own people free speech? We either believe in freedom or we don’t. If we don’t, we can hardly expect its benefits from others. The deal is up to us to take or not.
America imposing “freedom” on other countries has understandably come under fire in recent decades. But rather than intervening militarily in intractable Middle Eastern political disputes, tariffs are entirely non-violent. And here’s the extra good news: this tough love need not be painful at all. All the UK would have to do is stop firing, blacklisting, and arresting people for thinking and saying the wrong things. Give free speech, get free trade. It is really that simple.
Of course, this problem is not unique to the UK. In France, a TV channel was <a href="https://europeanconservative.com/articles/news/french-tv-channel-fined-for-calling-abortion-the-worlds-leading-cause-of-death" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fined 100,000 euro</a> for stating that abortion is the leading cause of death worldwide, while in Finland, a sitting parliamentarian has been on <a href="https://adfinternational.org/en-gb/campaign/free-speech-on-trial" target="_blank" rel="noopener">criminal trial</a> under the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity sections of their penal code – launched by the attorney general – for years, simply for tweeting a Bible verse (a bishop has faced similar persecution).
The European Union’s deleterious approach to open discourse on social media has been widely publicized by Vance and Musk, among others. Perhaps freedom tariffs are benefits that can be extended beyond the Special Relationship.
* * *
Calum Miller is a research fellow at University of Oxford and a registered medical doctor.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

TOPSHOT-US-POLITICS-TRUMP

President Trump Should Impose ‘Freedom Tariffs’ On Europe

England

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President Trump

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Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo knows the real danger of online censorship.
The husband and father of five <a href="https://morningstarnews.org/2025/02/two-christians-in-egypt-released-after-three-years-in-jail/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">walked out</a> of an Egyptian jail recently after three years of detention. The reason for his punishment? Authorities had taken a dislike to his participation in a private Facebook group.
Abdo was a Christian convert from Islam, and liked to discuss theology with other likeminded friends online. Expressing his faith online cost him his freedom – and placed him in immensely difficult conditions, as he battled failing health from a Cairo cell.
The comparison to America’s recent “vibe shift” toward freedom could not be starker. Zuckerberg’s apparent “U-Turn” on free speech last month brought much jubilation to conservative commentators, who had voiced concern for years about the censorship of lawful content on Meta. “It’s time to get back to our roots on free expression,” said the social media mogul, after scrapping his notorious “third party fact checking program” in favor of a “community notes” approach to verifying information, modeled after Elon Musk’s X.
Zuckerberg’s fresh perspective is a clear leap forward in the march against censorship. But as the experience of Abdo in Egypt warns, it isn’t only social media companies who can pose a threat to our right to speak. As free as social media platforms ought to be, governments can nevertheless seize power to shut down speech they don’t like, wherever it may appear.
Few are shocked to learn of unjust crackdowns against “blasphemy” in the Muslim world, in which Abdulbaqi is based. But the problem of state censorship is thriving in the West too. Last week, it was reported that British deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner is set to create a “council on Islamophobia” amidst turmoil on the streets of England – a move which could severely limit free speech and criticism of religious views. The announcement came days after a man was arrested in Manchester for <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/greater-manchester-islamic-manchester-arena-greater-manchester-police-twitter-b2691184.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">burning</a> a Koran, and later publicly named by police, despite the risk of threats posed to his life. Recently, in another incident, a Bristol preacher was similarly <a href="https://www.gbnews.com/news/two-tier-policing-christian-pastor-arrested-bristol-preaching-islam-adf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">arrested</a> for daring to compare Islam and Christianity in public, in answer to a question. And in Wakefield, Police recorded a “hate incident” against a 14-year-old autistic boy who <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11821157/14-year-old-autistic-boys-naive-prank-scuffed-copy-Koran.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">scuffed</a> a Koran at school. Following death threats, the child was forced into hiding, but police refused to prosecute his tormentors for fear of “escalating” the situation. Instead, his white British mother donned a hijab and begged for forgiveness at the local mosque. 
Granted, most leaders in the West do not voice support for outright blasphemy laws of the kind we see across the Middle East and North Africa. But many instead welcome these undemocratic initiatives via more cleverly disguised “hate speech laws.”
Examples abound.
Take Finland. A member of parliament, Päivi Räsänen, will soon be heading to <a href="https://adfinternational.org/cases/paivi" target="_blank" rel="noopener">criminal trial</a> at the Supreme Court because of a Bible-verse tweet she posted in 2019. Her tweet questioned her church’s sponsorship of a “pride” event – making her a heretic of the state religion of “woke”. It wasn’t a social media platform that censored her Christian view – but the state authorities.
Meanwhile in Mexico, a court <a href="https://adfinternational.org/cases/gabriel-quadri-mexico" target="_blank" rel="noopener">convicted</a> a politician and former presidential candidate, Gabriel Quadri, of “gender based political violence” &#8211; all because he spoke out on “X” about trans-identifying males taking spaces in Congress designated for females. As part of his punishment, he was made to attend a re-education course, and forced to tweet an apology for his words every day, twice a day, for fifteen days.
And in Australia, a <a href="https://adfinternational.org/cases/billboard-chris-australia" target="_blank" rel="noopener">legal showdown</a> in March will see “X” and internet sensation “Billboard Chris” take on the Australian “e-Safety Commissioner,” who censored a tweet upholding the truth on protecting kids from harmful gender ideology.
Freedom of expression is a universal human right. But commitments to free speech from “X” and Meta are only as good as the countries in which they operate – as Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo knows only too well.
Yet while we celebrate his release from an Egyptian prison this week, the West can hardly lecture Egypt on ending archaic blasphemy laws when we’re intent on introducing our own.
* * *
Paul Coleman is the executive director of ADF International and author of “Censored: How European Hate Speech Laws are Threatening Freedom of Speech.”
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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