President Joe Biden has just two months left in office before President-elect Donald Trump takes over — but that’s just enough time for one last scandal.
The Biden administration has been caught spending an eyewatering $267 million in taxpayer money since 2021 on research grants and contracts related to battling online “misinformation,” a 3,800% increase from the Trump administration’s $6.72 million in similar spending, according to a new report from Open the Books.
The spending includes surveillance of social media posts and creation of “counter-messages” to combat what Democratic officials deem false information, particularly around COVID-19 policies — many of which turned out to be ineffective.
“Researchers on this Biden-era grant examined how so-called ‘populist’ leaders supposedly prevented society from coming together in ‘solidarity’ during the COVID pandemic. Trump’s presidency was a focus of the research, along with the leaders of three other countries,” Open the Books reported.
“What we found is clear evidence that the Biden-Harris White House used funds to support or develop Orwellian surveillance and propaganda strategies, create methods and tools to restrict speech online, and even to finance highly politicized reports critical of Trump.”
Major grants also included $2.3 million to the University of Pennsylvania for “investigating and identifying the heterogeneity in COVID-19 misinformation exposure on social media among black and rural communities to inform precision public health messaging.”
The Department of Homeland Security contracted Guidehouse for $1.2 million to conduct “misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation analysis,” including deploying monitoring tools and creating counter-messaging.
“The federal government shouldn’t be involved, directly or indirectly, in the fact-checking industry. Nor should it engage in efforts designed to limit the speech of citizens, particularly when taxpayers are the ones footing the bill,” wrote Justin Haskins, senior fellow at The Heartland Institute.
The National Science Foundation provided nearly $200,000 to George Washington University researchers studying Trump’s pandemic communication, with recommendations to give more authority to government experts in future health crises.
The Biden administration has made sure to keep the tap open and the taxpayer funds flowing to their pro-Democratic propaganda machine, too.
The UPenn grant remains active until 2027, which could mean a continued expansion of federal involvement in monitoring — and “correcting” — free speech.