SCOOP: Fact-checking attacks on Secretary Marco Rubio's elimination of an anti-American, censorship-happy bureau

THE LOWDOWN:

• Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the State Department will shutter the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference Hub (R-FIMI), the successor to the controversial Global Engagement Center (GEC).

• During his years in the Senate, Rubio worked extensively to combat threats from China, Russia, and Iran.

• Rubio’s latest move, to eliminate the GEC’s successor, got immediate backup from others in the administration, like Dan Bishop, the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). His moves come after lawmakers led by Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) exposed how the GEC “spen[t] millions of dollars subsidizing censorship of conservatives.”

• At least as far back as 2023, Issa was calling for the GEC’s elimination.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the State Department will shutter the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference Hub (R-FIMI), the successor to the controversial Global Engagement Center (GEC).

The move prompted a series of attacks from liberals at the New York Times and elsewhere, who claim that this move could jeopardize America’s work to “counter[] global disinformation from foreign actors, including the governments of China, Russia and Iran.”

During his years in the Senate, Rubio worked extensively to combat threats from China, Russia, and Iran. He led the way, for example, on the bipartisan Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act, which directly strikes at the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) bottom line. Additionally, Rubio was sanction ed by the CCP.

Rubio’s latest move, to eliminate the GEC’s successor, got immediate backup from others in the administration, like Dan Bishop, the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). His moves come after lawmakers led by Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) exposed how the GEC “spen[t] millions of dollars subsidizing censorship of conservatives.”

At least as far back as 2023, Issa was calling for the GEC’s elimination.

“The federal government has plenty of offices that issue reports,” he said at the time. “If that’s all the GEC is going to do, its future may be as limited as its record of success.”

“The American people don’t need an obscure agency to ‘protect’ them from speech by silencing, censoring or banning them,” Rubio pointed out, adding that “the State Department will no longer be spending taxpayer dollars to censor Americans.”

Rubio’s move will save Americans up to $65 million per year, the State Department noted.

“There is extensive evidence showing the GEC (R-FIMI) engaged in controversial practices that used third party entities to censor and police the speech of private U.S. citizens,” a senior State Department official noted to the Washington Reporter. “There is plenty of evidence, all showcased in Secretary Rubio’s op-ed, that lay out a these examples. Perhaps the NYT doesn’t care because they agree these voices should be silenced, but this runs directly counter to our American values.”