May 25, 2018, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement blasting the European Union’s new Internet regulations, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and urging the U.S. to respond with trade sanctions:
“The European Union’s new privacy regulations, GDPR, have gone into effect, forcing U.S.-based companies like Facebook and Twitter to comply with the new draconian anti-free speech scheme. Because the rules, Facebook, Twitter, Apple, and Google all are impacted negatively by compliance issues and have been left scrambling. Tens of millions of users and thousands of smaller companies are affected. Europe’s attempted cyber imperialism is forcing U.S. companies to comply with their rules or be fined tens millions of dollars per violation. This disrupts free markets, free trade and free speech.
“All of the privacy notifications Americans have been receiving, let’s be honest, have nothing to do with the concocted claims against a company known as Cambridge Analytica, which served as a proxy for the destructive impact of the new European regulations. Effectively, Europe’s regulations have broken the world wide web and the U.S. must intervene to protect Americans’ First Amendment rights.
“The first step that should be considered is bringing the DNS function back under U.S. control by renewing the NTIA contract with ICANN, providing that entity with the protection it needs from international pressures brought on the EU regulation. ICANN has been caught in GDPR as well. Next, the Department of Commerce should immediately review whether the GDPR violates trade between the U.S. and EU countries, and take immediate action to pressure the EU to rescind its ill-conceived regulatory takeover of the Internet.
“America’s invention of the Internet has been one of its greatest gifts to the world. The increased democratization of information is directly related to the Internet providing a free flow of information unfettered by government regulation. It is understandable for countries like Iran and China to fear an informed, diverse population. Europe’s 20th cnetury embrace of democratic pluralism is at odds with imposing this sort of group think on its citizens, and America must not stand for it. In short, too many Americans died to keep Europe free to allow pointy headed bureaucrats in Brussels to screw it up.”
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