EXCLUSIVE-US plans online portal to bypass content bans in Europe and elsewhere

By Simon Lewis, Humeyra Pamuk and Gram Slattery

WASHINGTON, Feb 18 (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department is developing an online portal that will enable people in Europe and elsewhere to see content banned by their governments including alleged hate speech and terrorist propaganda, a move Washington views as a way to counter censorship, three sources familiar with the plan said.

The site will be hosted at "freedom.gov," the sources said. One source said officials had discussed including a virtual private network function to make a user's traffic appear to originate in the U.S. and added that user activity on the site will not be tracked.

Headed by Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers, the project was expected to be unveiled at last week's Munich Security Conference but was delayed, the sources said.

Reuters could not determine why the launch did not happen, but some State Department officials, including lawyers, have raised concerns about the plan, two of the sources said, without detailing the concerns.

The project could further strain ties between the Trump administration and traditional U.S. allies in Europe, already heightened by disputes over trade, Russia’s war in Ukraine and President Donald Trump’s push to assert control over Greenland.

The portal could also put Washington in the unfamiliar position of appearing to encourage citizens to flout local laws.

In a statement to Reuters, a State Department spokesperson said the U.S. government does not have a censorship-circumvention program specific to Europe but added: “Digital freedom is a priority for the State Department, however, and that includes the proliferation of privacy and censorship-circumvention technologies like VPNs."

The spokesperson denied any announcement had been delayed and said it was inaccurate that State Department lawyers had raised concerns.

The Trump administration has made free speech, particularly what it sees as the stifling of conservative voices online, a focus of its foreign policy including in Europe and in Brazil.

Europe's approach to free speech differs from the U.S., where the Constitution protects virtually all expression. The European Union's limits grew from efforts to fight any resurgence of extremist propaganda that fueled Nazism including its vilification of Jews, foreigners and minorities.

U.S. officials have denounced EU policies that they say are suppressing right-wing politicians, including in Romania, Germany and France, and have claimed rules like the EU's Digital Services Act and Britain's Online Safety Act limit free speech.

The EU delegation in Washington, which acts like an embassy for the 27-country bloc, did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the U.S. plan.

In rules that fall most heavily on social media sites and large platforms like Meta's META.O Facebook and X, the EU restricts the availability — and in some cases requires rapid removal — of content classified as illegal hate speech, terrorist propaganda or harmful disinformation under a group of rules, laws and decisions since 2008.

FRICTION WITH EUROPEAN REGULATORS

Rogers of the State Department has emerged as an outspoken advocate of the Trump administration position on EU content policies. She has visited more than half a dozen European countries since taking office in October and met with representatives of right-wing groups that the administration says are being oppressed. The department did not make Rogers available for an interview.

In a National Security Strategy published in December, the Trump administration warned that Europe faced "civilisational erasure" because of its migration policies. It said the U.S. would prioritize "cultivating resistance to Europe's current trajectory within European nations."

EU regulators regularly require U.S.-based sites to remove content and can impose bans as a measure of last resort. X, which is owned by Trump ally Elon Musk, was hit with a 120 million-euro fine in December for noncompliance.

Germany, for example, in 2024 issued 482 removal orders for material it deemed supported or incited terrorism and forced providers to take down 16,771 pieces of content.

Similarly, Meta's oversight board in 2024 ordered the removal of a Polish political party's posts that used a racial slur and depicted immigrants as rapists, a content category EU law treats as illegal hate speech.

Calling the U.S. plan "a direct shot" at European rules and laws, former State Department official Kenneth Propp, who worked on European digital regulations and is now at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center, said freedom.gov "would be perceived in Europe as a U.S. effort to frustrate national law provisions."

Also involved in the U.S. portal effort is Edward Coristine, a former member of Musk's job-slashing Department of Government Efficiency, two sources said. Coristine works with the National Design Studio, created by Trump to beautify government websites. Reuters was unable to reach Coristine for comment.

It was not clear what advantages the U.S. government portal would offer users that are not available from commercial VPNs.

The web address freedom.gov was registered on January 12, according to the federal registry get.gov. On Wednesday, the site had no content but showed the National Design Studio's logo, the words "fly, eagle, fly" and a log-in form.

Before Trump's second term, the U.S. government helped fund commercial VPNs and other tools as part of efforts to promote democracy globally and help users access free information in China, Iran, Russia, Belarus, Cuba, Myanmar and other countries.