EXCLUSIVE – A law firm has submitted public records requests to five major universities as part of an investigation into allegations of a “censorship regime” purportedly established under the Biden administration.
“Free speech is essential to a free society,” stated Phil Sechler, Senior Counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) and director of its Center for Free Speech, in a press release obtained by Fox News Digital.
Sechler emphasized, “The American people have a right to know if their tax dollars were used to suppress certain voices and how involved state actors were—and are—in social media censorship.”
The universities targeted in this investigation include the University of Michigan (UM), the University of Wisconsin (UW), Indiana University (IU), the University of North Carolina (UNC), and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
In support of their claims, ADF referenced an executive order signed by President Donald Trump on January 20, 2025, aimed at restoring free speech and terminating previous censorship practices.
The White House stated that the federal government would refrain from censoring speech on social media and other online platforms, asserting that prior actions were taken “under the guise of combating ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ and ‘malinformation.’”
ADF alleges that these universities have established “misinformation” centers that serve to “censor speech.” For instance, the ADF highlighted UM’s Center for Social Media Responsibility (CSMR), which, according to its website, seeks to “address the negative effects of broad access to the means of public communication, while amplifying positive effects.”
CSMR elaborates that while social media product managers, designers, and engineers “are the day-to-day policymakers of today’s social media landscape,” the center aims to assist these individuals in articulating “principles” and developing “metrics and tools” for responsible policy-making.
The law firm is seeking records related to CSMR that include any communication between CSMR administrators and federal officials. Additionally, ADF is requesting documents that detail interactions between CSMR directors and employees of major social media platforms such as Google, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Snapchat, and Reddit.
By acquiring this communication, ADF hopes to identify “censorship red flags,” including terms like “cancel,” “throttle,” “First Amendment,” and “free speech.”
Moreover, ADF referenced a report from the U.S. House Judiciary Committee released in February, which revealed that UM officials proposed an AI tool to the National Science Foundation (NSF) aimed at “externalizing the difficult responsibility of censorship.”
The Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government noted that the NSF had issued “multi-million-dollar grants to university and non-profit research teams” to address “alleged misinformation” concerning COVID-19 and the 2020 election.
Given that the NSF is responsible for funding censorship initiatives, ADF is also interested in records that mention the National Science Foundation and NSF.
ADF suspects that CSMR and equivalent institutions at IU, UW, UNC, and UCLA collaborated with the Biden administration.
Sechler asserted that the Biden administration “established a censorship regime aimed at suppressing so-called ‘misinformation’ and other speech deemed unfavorable to the government,” which included funding censorship tools developed by public universities.
“The U.S. government should defend our First Amendment right to free speech, not be its greatest threat,” he added.
As of now, UM, IU, UW, UNC, and UCLA, along with representatives for former President Joe Biden, have not responded to requests for comments from Fox News Digital.