[thedays]

I am not a lawyer but this CDC order seems contrary to Trump’s recent Executive Order “RESTORING FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND ENDING FEDERAL CENSORSHIP”.

This Executive Order states in part: “Government censorship of speech is intolerable in a free society.

… Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States to: (a) secure the right of the American people to engage in constitutionally protected speech;

(b) ensure that no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen; …

Sec. 3. Ending Censorship of Protected Speech. (a) No Federal department, agency, entity, officer, employee, or agent may act or use any Federal resources in a manner contrary to section 2 of this order.”

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/rest...

[theptip]

It seems fairly clear that free speech does not apply to government employees acting in their official duty.

The order is concerned with government censoring private individuals.

[blotfaba]

It does feel like some straight "war is peace" kind of, uh.. shenanigangs and things

[freitasm]

No one (inside the government) probably considers that EO to be valid. It's just for "the others".

[atoav]

You think laws still count with an immune president who has packed the supreme court and DOJ?

Laws don't count with Don, conventions don't count, rules don't count. The only thing that counts is power.

And he has it now.

[immibis]

I believe this is called doublespeak due to George Orwell, and many fascist dictatorships do it.

[hyperbrainer]

Standard doublespeak.

[e40]

If you understand the language wasn’t English bit Newspeak, then it makes perfect sense.

[jasonlotito]

This is an administration that is actively ignoring other EOs such as anti-DEI initiatives. An administration that has come out and said that either all humans are neither male or female, or both male and female at once. This is an administration that either tried to send $50M in condoms to Gaza, or thought their followers were too stupid to believe the lie. This is also the administration that hates the military, police, and Americans in general. None of this is debatable. It's backed up by action. So, not surprised why we'd think they'd be burdened by the law.

[AnthonyMouse]

> this CDC order seems contrary to Trump’s recent Executive Order

Freedom of speech and the First Amendment generally apply to the government imposing penalties on private citizens, e.g. through criminal law.

The CDC is the government. The government as an employer regularly imposes speech restrictions on government employees and always has, e.g. if you're a public school teacher and you want to teach students to believe that vaccines cause autism, they can tell you not to do that and fire you if you don't. You can imagine the trouble if that wasn't the case.

[tsimionescu]

> You can imagine the trouble if that wasn't the case.

While you're absolutely right, just wanted to take this opportunity to point out that we may well not need to imagine this particular scenario, unfortunately, as it might happen very soon indeed.

[GeneralMayhem]

When Trump (or Republicans, generally) say "free speech", they patently do not mean what the rest of us mean by free speech. They mean:

1. Everyone should be able to say horrible things about sexual and racial minorities.

2. Everyone should be able to deny scientific facts that are inconvenient to Republican ideology, the fossil fuel industry, or any of their friends.

3. There can be no consequences for (1) or (2), even when it obviously contradicts other laws (libel, incitement of violence, fraud, etc.) or oaths (to truth, to the constitution).

4. Stating a fact or opinion contrary to (1) or (2) is in fact trampling the free-speech rights of right-wingers, and is therefore forbidden.

They don't want free speech. They want free speech for themselves, and enforced consent, if not assent, from everyone else.

[dinkumthinkum]

All right, then by this logic what does the left mean by "free speech". You talk about scientific facts, so does the left believe we cannot say scientific facts about biology? Furthermore, I'm not aware of any censorship regarding fossil fuels. My understanding is that the Sierra Club and Thunberg are able to say whatever they want in this country if this is what you are talking about.

[KaiserPro]

This is my thought exactly. If you are requiring re-working of papers to exclude certain words, that sounds like censorship to me.

[duxup]

Generally when it comes to Trump it is rhetoric indicating the opposite.

He complains about a bias government, to install his own loyalists.

Same goes for science.

Rule of law…

[ballooney]

_biased_ is the adjective, bias is a noun.

[jcranmer]

In my experience, the more loudly someone shouts about being a crusader for free speech, the more likely they are to actively be attacking others' freedom of speech.

[rhinoceraptor]

[flagged]

[pizza]

The more re-truths it gets, the truther it is..

[gmueckl]

Wow, this is such a concise description of what has been going on with the far right in the US and Europe for the last decade! I'm glad to finally have a name for it. Thanks!

[dboreham]

Projection.

[vinni2]

If only millions of American's knew he would do that when they voted for him and supported him. They still do I don’t think they care.

[jfengel]

They care very much. They think it's great.

[eastbound]

It seems like behavior matters.

[userbinator]

Someone should tell him about it then...

[sneak]

Retraction isn’t censorship, and bans on what you can publish at work as part of your job are not restraints on your individual right to free expression.

[cyberax]

> In the order, CDC researchers were instructed to remove references to or mentions of a list of forbidden terms: “Gender, transgender, pregnant person, pregnant people, LGBT, transsexual, non-binary, nonbinary, assigned male at birth, assigned female at birth, biologically male, biologically female,” according to an email sent to CDC employees (see below).”

So yep, censorship. Any article that even _mentions_ LGBT (e.g. for epidemiological reasons) is now prohibited to be even referenced.

[bigstrat2003]

This argument doesn't hold water when the left does it, and it doesn't hold water in this instance either. Censorship does not only mean government infringement upon freedom of individual expression.

[baran1]

lookup the word censorship