For our first annual Free Speech Awards, the Media Research Center (MRC) is honoring 35 champions of the First Amendment, including five members of the U.S. Senate today, 10 members of the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday, 10 additional public officials on Wednesday and 10 outstanding advocates of free speech in non-governmental organizations on Thursday.
Today MRC is honoring the five senators who have stood strong for Americans’ free speech rights, especially on social media.
The winners of the MRC’s 2024 Free Speech Awards are as follows: Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Mike Lee (R-UT), Roger Marshall (R-KS), Rand Paul (R-KY) and Eric Schmitt (R-MO). While Big Tech companies and leftists across the spectrum of politics and society have spoken out against free speech, these five senators have distinguished themselves in the fight to preserve it.
In announcing this year’s winners, MRC Founder and President Brent Bozell said: “Today marks the beginning of the MRC Free Speech Awards with the 2024 Top 5 Senators to defend free speech. While the Senate is far from being under conservative leadership, their efforts have stopped massive government censorship.”
Bozell continued: “Senators Mike Lee and Rand Paul led the charge against provisions in the Kids Online Safety Act that would have increased government censorship and decreased parental rights. Ted Cruz fought to reform Section 230 to prevent Big Tech platforms from censoring average Americans. Eric Schmitt launched the case against the federal government for censoring Americans and continues the fight in the Senate. Senator Roger Marshal continues to hold Google and other Big Tech platforms accountable. We at the MRC applaud these virtuous efforts.”
All five of the Senators have faced online censorship, and MRC has documented cases of censorship from all five in our exclusive CensorTrack database.
♦ 2024 MRC Free Speech Award Winner: Sen. Ted Cruz
Sen. Cruz is a former Solicitor General of Texas who argued nine cases before the Supreme Court before becoming one of the greatest fighters for free speech in Congress.
As a senator, Cruz has led the effort to reform Section 230 to prevent Big Tech platforms from censoring constitutionally-protected speech and for consistently applying constitutional principles to protect the First Amendment.
He has relentlessly called out platforms like Google, GoFundMe, Facebook and Twitter for their relentless censorship, leftist bias and election interference. Cruz’s record includes holding Google accountable for its abuse of market dominance. Cruz also thwarted an attempt in the Senate to allow the legacy media to ignore antitrust laws and jointly negotiate with social media companies on content distribution.
Cruz also went to bat for free speech when the stakes were highest, writing to then-Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey in 2020, calling for answers on the rampant censorship from the platform during a presidential election year.
The Texas Senator has also been vigilant against new threats against free speech as they emerge, condemning a DHS-backed censorship operation exposed by the MRC.
♦ 2024 MRC Free Speech Award Winner: Sen. Mike Lee
Sen. Lee has represented Utah in Congress since 2011. He has led the fight against Sen. Richard Blumenthal’s (D-CT) censorship provisions in the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) and consistently applied constitutional principles to protect free speech rights. His relentless fight for liberty as a public official has included not only legislation and intense advocacy during hearings but also being a voice against censorship in the media and on social media.
Lee was such a fierce fighter against Big Tech censorship that he was censored by Google alongside other Big Tech critics. Google buried Lee’s website during his reelection campaign in 2022. Lee has also worked to hold Meta and pre-Elon Twitter accountable for the suppression of free speech.
Lee has even taken on government efforts to censor free speech, working to defund the Biden-Harris administration’s now-defunct Disinformation Governance Board.
♦ 2024 MRC Free Speech Award Winner: Sen. Roger Marshall
Sen. Marshall is a veteran, a doctor, a former congressman and a U.S. Senator from Kansas who refuses to be silent about Big Tech’s constant efforts to suppress free speech.
Marshall has highlighted abuses by Google and other Big Tech platforms and held these companies accountable for depriving Americans of their free speech rights. He has used his background as a doctor to speak up for the right to life and to push back against censorship during the COVID-19 pandemic that threatened Americans’ civil liberties. For the latter stance, Facebook even censored Marshall.
Marshall has fired back against the Big Tech titans for silencing him and others for exercising their right to free speech, from defending Live Action from censorship on TikTok to taking up the case of independent journalist Alex Berenson after the Biden-Harris administration targeted him for censorship. Marshall has also led the charge in demanding answers from Google over whether the search giant suppressed searches for the first assassination attempt on Trump.
♦ 2024 MRC Free Speech Award Winner: Sen. Rand Paul
Sen. Paul was raised to be a defender of free speech as the son of another champion of liberty, former Rep. Ron Paul (R-KY). He is also a doctor who pushed back against the censorship of so-called misinformation and disinformation that the government, the media and Big Tech attempted to justify during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Paul has fought against Big Tech platforms such as YouTube, which have censored him and so many other Americans. He has called for governmental officials, like Dr. Antony Fauci, to be held accountable for their role in promoting censorship. Alongside other senators, Paul has also fought to end Big Tech-government collusion to censor speech. Paul has been a fierce opponent of Blumenthal’s drive to censor speech through KOSA.
♦ 2024 MRC Free Speech Award Winner: Sen. Eric Schmitt
Sen. Schmitt was a champion for free speech even before he was elected to the U.S. Senate. As attorney general of Missouri, Schmitt launched the historic Murthy v. Missouri litigation against the Biden-Harris Administration and has continued his fight for the First Amendment in the US Senate.
Schmitt has also consistently defended the right to free speech as a senator. In August, Schmitt used his influential position to warn Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg against engaging in censorship ahead of the 2024 election.
In addition, Schmitt called for legislation to protect Americans’ rights when the Supreme Court refused to: “Now, Congress must step up and do our job to make sure Americans’ right to freedom of speech is not eroded any further. I call on Congress to pass my Censorship Accountability Act and my COLLUDE Act immediately.”
