The share of Americans who support censoring online speech has declined in recent years, according to a new survey, but more than half still support some form of censorship. The Pew Research Center recently published a study that found that 51% of Americans support government censorship of online information deemed “false,” down from 55% in 2023, and 60% support tech and social media companies censoring “false” information, down from 65% in 2023.
In 2018, only 39% supported government censorship of “false” information, but that share rose to 48% by 2021. However, a majority (56% in 2018 and 59% in 2021) of Americans have supported tech and social media companies censoring “false” information.
Division on the subject is sharper between political parties but has begun to even out. In 2018, 37% of Republican voters and Republican-leaning Independent voters supported government censorship of “false” information online, just a few points behind the 40% of Democratic voters and Democratic-leaning Independent voters who supported the same. By 2021, only 28% of Republicans and Republican leaners supported government censorship of “false” information, as opposed to 65% of Democrats and Democratic leaners. In 2023, 39% of Republicans and Republican leaners and 70% of Democrats and Democratic leaners supported government censorship. As of this year, more Republicans and Republican leaners (43%) and fewer Democrats and Democratic leaners (58%) support government censorship.
Support for tech and social media companies censoring “false” information online, however, has been measurably higher across the political spectrum over the years, although significantly higher amongst Democrats and Democratic leaners. In 2018, 48% of Republicans and Republican leaners and 60% of Democrats and Democratic leaners supported tech and social media companies censoring “false” information. By 2021, the share of Republicans and Republican leaners supporting such measures had fallen steeply, down to 37%, while the share of Democrats and Democratic leaners had jumped to 76%. By 2023, 48% of Republicans and Republican leaners once again supported tech and social media companies censoring “false” information, as did 81% of Democrats and Democratic leaners. The latest numbers show a slight dip in support for such measures among Republicans and Republican leaners, falling now to 47%, and a more significant drop among Democrats and Democratic leaners, down to 73%.
In comments to The Washington Stand, FRC Action Director Matt Carpenter explained, “I think much of the partisan shift in support for censoring online material is a continuation of what we all experienced during COVID-19.” He continued, “Democrats were much more likely to comply with the diktats of public health officials and media apparatchiks and thus supported efforts to curb competing narratives on their preferred social media and traditional media outlets, while Republicans were more likely to seek information elsewhere and wanted alternative views to compete against the corporate-government-media-narratives around COVID.”
“The irony here is that it’s not hard to find exceptions to this,” Carpenter observed. He clarified, “For example, Democrats tend to favor as much access as possible to pornography, and they will even argue children should be able to freely access pornography. Whereas Republicans will be more likely to support limiting access to pornography on social media and certainly support protecting minors from accessing pornography online.” He continued, “Because it’s easy to find exceptions, I suspect we will see future Pew Research studies which show Democrats moving away from supporting online censorship, and Republicans moving toward it. In other words, I think this data is mostly a reflection of the influence of Big Tech on topics of interest to the public.”
The Pew Research Center conducted its survey in February and shared that the research was prompted by Meta (the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) announcing an end to its censorship and fact-checking programs. At the time, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that much online censorship is “clearly political.” Meta — and Facebook in particular — previously earned a reputation for censorship, suppressing and even removing numerous posts related to COVID-19 and the 2020 presidential election. Some content which was initially labeled “false,” such as the claim that COVID-19 originated in a virology laboratory in Wuhan or new reports about Hunter Biden’s laptop, was later revealed to be factually accurate.
The results of the Pew Research Center study also come shortly after the U.S. State Department shuttered its Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference office, formerly known as the Global Engagement Center, which was responsible for “silenc[ing] and censor[ing] the voices of Americans they were supposed to be serving,” according to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Lamenting the damage done by the censorship initiative, Rubio added, “Over the last decade, Americans have been slandered, fired, charged, and even jailed for simply voicing their opinions.”