Republican Rep. Chris Smith, who represents the US state of New Jersey and is a member of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he is drafting a bill related to blocking X in Brazil.
Smith made this announcement in a note published on his website on Wednesday (11), in which he stated that he asked the Brazilian State to reverse the suspension of Elon Musk’s social network, determined at the end of August by the Minister of the Supreme Federal Court (STF) Alexandre de Moraes because the company refused to indicate a legal representative in Brazil.
Weeks earlier, X had closed its office in the country. Musk had been disregarding Moraes’ orders to block content and profiles because he considered them illegal.
“The Brazilian government has outdone itself and hit rock bottom — after persecuting political opposition by removing them from social media, it has now banned one of the world’s largest news networks and made it illegal for Brazilians to access it,” Smith said in the statement.
“Brazil must reverse this path immediately. Threats to freedom of expression are threats to free elections and to democracy itself,” said the Republican.
In May, Smith presided over a hearing in the United States House on the removal of X profiles and content ordered by Moraes and the following month asked the minister for clarification on the matter.
“On June 21, I sent a letter to Minister Alexandre de Moraes asking for information on allegations regarding Moraes’ role in widespread human rights violations,” Smith said in the statement released Wednesday.
“Minister Moraes did not respond — I also did not receive any response from the presidents of the Federal Senate [Rodrigo Pacheco] and the Chamber of Deputies [Arthur Lira]who also received the letter I sent to Moraes,” added the Republican.
“To respond to the crisis that Moraes has created in Brazil, I am now working with colleagues on a bill on the issue,” said Smith, who is chairman of the U.S. House Global Subcommittee on Human Rights.
He did not elaborate on what measures the proposal would contain. After the X blockade in Brazil, other Republican politicians, such as former congressman George Santos and senator Mike Lee, called for sanctions to be imposed on Brazil.
Before the May hearing, Smith had also requested information from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) about accusations of censorship of the right in Brazil. In the statement released on Wednesday, Smith did not clarify whether he had received a response.
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