Non-public documents obtained by the House Judiciary Committee and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government demonstrate that these federal bureaucrats, "disinformation" researchers, and non-profit groups understood that their actions—"content moderation" and combatting so-called misinformation—amounted to "censorship." And yet, NSF forged ahead, supporting new technologies that would essentially enable the censorship of online speech "at scale."
From legal scholars to conservative journalists, NSF tracked any public criticism of its work in funding misinformation projects. NSF went so far as to develop a media strategy that considered blacklisting certain American media outlets because they were scrutinizing NSF's funding of censorship and propaganda tools.