The U.S. State Department is preparing an online portal designed to give users in Europe and other locations access to content restricted under local laws. The site is part of a broader push by the Trump administration to promote what it calls digital freedom. 

Officials involved in the project, hosted at Freedom.gov, claim the portal is a response to speech regulations abroad that they argue suppress lawful expression. Critics note that the site would allow users to view material that governments in their home countries have ordered blocked, including content categorized as hate speech or extremist propaganda.

Under discussion is a plan by US officials to build the site with virtual private network functionality that would route user traffic through US-based servers, making it appear as though visitors are browsing from within the US. The site may be built so that visitor activity is not logged. 

The domain registration records show Freedom.gov was secured in January. As of this week, a placeholder page displays a short message: 

Freedom is Coming 

Information is power. Reclaim your human right to free expression. 

Get ready. 

Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers is overseeing the effort. The project was expected to debut during last week’s Munich Security Conference, though it remains only a landing page. News reports suggest certain US government officials have voiced issues with the proposed site. There is still no official State Department press release for Freedom.gov. 

Contrasting Views on Free Speech

The initiative debuts amid an already strained relationship between Washington and the EU over online speech. In the US, constitutional protections for expression are expansive. In contrast, European governments have enacted laws aimed at curbing incitement and extremist messaging, shaped in part by the continent’s 20th-century history.

The European Union’s Digital Services Act requires large platforms to remove illegal content swiftly and improve transparency around moderation and advertising systems. Britain’s Online Safety Act imposes related obligations. 

Regulators have enforced those rules with significant penalties. Elon Musk’s social media platform X was fined by the European Commission for failing to meet transparency standards.

In 2024, Germany issued hundreds of orders requiring providers to take down material deemed to support terrorism, resulting in the removal of thousands of posts. In a separate case, Meta’s independent oversight board directed the deletion of posts by a Polish political party that used racial slurs and portrayed migrants as criminals, content considered unlawful under European hate speech standards.

International Tensions

Trump administration officials have criticized such measures, arguing they restrict political viewpoints, particularly on the right. Vice President J.D. Vance, speaking in Munich, said he believed free expression was under pressure in Europe and suggested American technology companies were being targeted unfairly.

It remains unclear how the government-run portal would differ in practice from commercially available VPN services, which many users already employ to bypass geographic restrictions. Before Trump’s second term, the U.S. government funded tools to help people in countries such as China and Iran access uncensored information. The current proposal would apply similar tactics in allied democracies, a shift that could further strain international diplomacy.