Megyn Kelly reacted over the weekend to a new survey that found nearly half of Democrats support limiting freedom of speech.
“This is what we’re up against,” Kelly wrote on the social media platform X — linking to a RealClearPolitics survey which showed a startlingly high number of Democrats backing censorship
According to the survey, 47% of Democrats say that speech should be legal “only under certain circumstances.”
A slim majority of Democrats (53%) agreed that speech should be legal under any circumstances while a third of Democrats (34%) think Americans have “too much freedom,” according to the poll.
Among registered Republicans, almost three quarters of them (74%) think speech should be legal “under any circumstances” while 61% of independents say the same, the RealClearPolitics survey found.
Just 14.6% of Republicans believe that Americans have “too much freedom” while nearly half of those who back the GOP (46%) were most likely to agree with the premise that Americans have too little freedom, according to the survey.
The poll also found that a majority of Democrats (52%) approve of the government censoring social media posts “under the rubric of protecting national security” while just a third of Republicans and independents say the same.
When poll respondents were read the statement “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,” just 31% of Democrats “strongly agreed” with it compared to 51% of Republicans, according to RealClearPolitics.
Earlier this year, a Pew Research Center poll found that Democrats were more likely than Republicans to support “tech companies and the US government restricting extremely violent content and false information online.”
When asked if the US government should take steps to restrict false information online — even if it limits freedom of information — 70% of Democrats or those who lean toward the Democrats agreed while just 39% of Republicans or those who lean GOP said the same, according to Pew.
The gap represents a stark contrast from 2018, when 40% of Dems and those who lean Democratic supported restrictions while 37% of Republicans and those who lean GOP said the same.
Earlier this year, several journalists collaborating with X mogul Elon Musk released “The Twitter Files” — a set of emails and correspondences which showed the extent to which the social media app’s previous management was in contact with federal agencies over content that was posted on the internet.
Twitter was among the networks that throttled The Post’s reporting on the Hunter Biden laptop in the weeks leading up to the 2020 presidential election.
Musk acquired Twitter last year for $44 billion with the aim of removing content moderation restrictions and allowing for more unfettered speech.
Since then, however, advertisers have fled the platform in the wake of controversial decisions by Musk to reinstate banned accounts, including those of former President Donald Trump.
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