The following remarks were submitted as written testimony at a hearing in front of the Senate Commerce Committee titled, “Shut Your App: How Uncle Sam Jawboned Big Tech Into Silencing Americans” on Oct. 8, 2025.
Chairman Cruz, Ranking Member Cantwell, and members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify on behalf of First Amendment speech and press rights and against authoritarian censorship designed to shut down the free speech rights of American citizens.
My name is Sean Davis, and I am the CEO and co-founder of The Federalist, a conservative digital media company focused on politics, culture, and religion. I am a Christian, a conservative, and a political commentator and reporter. I am also the victim of illegal and unconstitutional censorship by my government which was targeted at my publication, my publication, and me personally.
The First Amendment affirms and protects five God-given rights: free speech, religion, press, assembly, and petition. In my capacity as the publisher of a major national media outlet which produces news and opinion, an infringement on or abridgement of any one of those five rights can be cataclysmic.
Unfortunately, my publication, our writers, and I were all directly targeted for destruction by my own government, using my tax dollars. Even worse, much of the targeting was done in secret, by individuals and institutions who were desperate to hide their illegal and unconstitutional actions against us. This long-running conspiracy to deprive us of our God-given First Amendment rights is illegal, unconstitutional, and unconscionable. Sadly, many senators who sit on this committee either refused to condemn and fight these censorship efforts, or outright supported them.
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