Global Crackdown: How Foreign Censorship Threatens American Free Speech Authored by Ben Weingarten via RealClearInvestigations, On the eve of a highly-anticipated live X “Spaces” conversation between Elon Musk and former president Donald Trump, the powerful (former) European Union Commissioner Thierry Breton warned in August that authorities would be “monitoring” the conversation for “content that may incite violence, hate, and racism.”  While reminding Musk that the EU was already investigating X for alleged failures “to combat disinformation,” Breton said he and his colleagues “will not hesitate to make full use of our toolbox … to protect EU citizens from serious harm.” The European Commission distanced itself from Breton, who would eventually resign his post while facing scrutiny from U.S. lawmakers for threatening Musk and Americans’ free speech and interfering in domestic politics. But the EU probe of X, which could result in crippling fines, persists. Although litigation, congressional oversight efforts, and reportage led by the Twitter Files have helped expose the U.S. government’s efforts to pressure social media companies to censor protected political speech, the recent rumblings from Europe underscore the escalating challenges American-based social media platforms are facing from foreign authorities – not just from repressive regimes such as China and Iran, but also from the EU, the U.K., Brazil, and other democracies.  Free speech advocates warn that foreign demands that tech companies comply with their censorious legal and regulatory standards that violate the First Amendment’s protections will hamper the ability of Americans to communicate freely in the digital public square. Facebook’s Community Standards, for example, “apply to everyone, all around the world.” Academics have termed the tendency of companies to apply the strictest local guidelines globally as the “Brussels Effect.” Mike Benz, a former State Department cyber official and executive director of the Foundation for Freedom Online, argues that foreign efforts to cast populist narratives