2023-08-25 House Judiciary Committee To Mayorkas Re Censorship Testimony

August 25, 2023
The Honorable Alejandro Mayorkas

Secretary
Department of Homeland Security
301 7th Street, SW
Washington, DC 20528
Dear Secretary Mayorkas:
We write regarding your July 26, 2023, testimony before the Committee at a hearing on
Oversight of the Department of Homeland Security. Your testimony at the hearing contained a
number of assertions about the Department’s censorship activities that are inconsistent with the
findings of a federal court and information in the Committee’s possession. Accordingly, we write
to provide you with an opportunity to correct your testimony to ensure it is accurate and
complete.
During the hearing, in response to a question from Representative Johnson, you testified
unequivocally that “the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency [CISA] does not
censor speech.”1 Your assertion, however, is contradicted by the findings of a federal court in
Missouri v. Biden, a case concerning government-induced censorship on social media platforms.
As the court found in its motion granting a preliminary injunction, “the evidence shows that the
CISA Defendants met with social-media companies to both inform and pressure them to censor
content protected by the First Amendment. They also apparently encouraged and pressured
social-media companies to change their content-moderation policies and flag disfavored
content.”2 CISA’s actions were part of a censorship-by-proxy apparatus employed by the
executive branch to remove disfavored content online.
In seeking to justify CISA’s censorship activities, you testified during the hearing that
“what we do at CISA . . . is identify the tactics that adverse nation[-]states use to weaponize
disinformation.”3 However, as Representative Johnson explained to you, ample evidence exists
1
Oversight of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security: Hearing Before the H. Comm. on the Judiciary, 118th
Cong. (July 26, 2023), at 56.
2
Missouri v. Biden, No. 3:22-cv-01213 (W.D. La. Jul. 4, 2023), ECF No. 293, at 110 (memorandum ruling granting
preliminary injunction).
3
Oversight of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, supra note 1, at 60.
August 25, 2023
Page 2
that CISA was not focused on only foreign disinformation, but rather indiscriminately flagged
so-called “misinformation”—including domestic speech protected by the First Amendment—to
various social media platforms.4 For example, the Missouri court found that “CISA did not do an
analysis to determine what percentage of misinformation was ‘foreign derived.’ Therefore, CISA
forward[ed] reports of information to social-media platforms without determining whether they
originated from foreign or domestic sources.”5 The Committee has also independently obtained a
significant volume of evidence, including documents produced by CISA, demonstrating that
CISA flagged alleged “misinformation,” including protected political speech of domestic origin,6
and even social media posts in 2020 by President Donald Trump.7
In response to a question from Representative Bishop about CISA’s practice of flagging

“misinformation” and “disinformation”—known internally as “switchboarding”—you testified
that CISA engaged in “switchboarding” in 2018 and 2020 but that it is “no longer employed by
CISA.”8 However, the Committee has obtained communications from February 2021, well after
the 2020 election, between CISA and social media companies in which CISA officials flagged
so-called disinformation “related to existing narratives regarding domestic elections” for
Facebook “at the request of an elections stakeholder.”9
Moreover, during a July 26, 2022, meeting of an advisory subcommittee to CISA,

CISA’s then-Senior Advisor of Election Security, Kim Wyman, stated that CISA is “currently
transferring this work”—referring to CISA’s “switchboard function”—to the “Information
Sharing and Analysis Centers (ISACs),”10 which are operated by the CISA-funded Center for
4
Id. at 61.
5
Id. at 73.
6
See, e.g., e-mail from Brian Scully to Twitter employees (Oct. 29, 2020, 7:31 PM) (on file with the Comm.).
7
E-mail from Brian Scully to Twitter employees (Oct. 27, 2020, 4:09 PM) (on file with the Comm.).
8
Oversight of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, supra note 1, at 114.
9
E-mail from Robert Schaul to Facebook employees (Feb. 1, 2021, 12:39 PM) (on file with the Comm.).
10
CISA CYBERSECURITY ADVISORY COMM., PROTECTING CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE FROM MISINFORMATION &
DISINFORMATION SUBCOMMITTEE MEETING JULY 26, 2022, at 1 (on file with the Comm.).
August 25, 2023
Page 3
Internet Security (CIS).11 Wyman admitted that CISA moved the “switchboard function” from
CISA to a CISA-funded third-party organization in order to evade the ongoing Missouri
litigation.12 This evidence indicates that CISA has outsourced its switchboarding to a CISA-
funded entity.
Finally, in response to Representative Massie’s question asking you to define

“malinformation,” you stated that “we’re dealing with false information that is used for a
particular purpose.”13 However, CISA defines so-called “malinformation” as information that is
“based on fact, but used out of context to mislead, harm, or manipulate.”14 Therefore, your
definition of “malinformation” as “false information” is inconsistent with your own department’s
definition of the term. Such an elastic and Orwellian definition of the term—especially when
used as the basis of censorship activities—presents serious issues for American civil liberties.
Your sworn testimony before Congress is contradicted not only by the findings of the
Missouri court, but by documents obtained through the Committee’s oversight. The Department
of Homeland Security, and especially CISA, are central to the Biden Administration’s censorship
efforts and the censorship-industrial complex writ large. Your testimony to the Committee was
either intentionally deceptive and misleading, or the result of an unacceptable ignorance on your
part regarding the activities of your own department. Accordingly, to ensure the record of your
testimony is complete and accurate with respect to the Department’s censorship activities, we
invite you to amend your testimony. Please do so by September 8, 2023.
Sincerely,
Jim Jordan Mike Johnson

Chairman Chairman
Subcommittee on the Constitution
and Limited Government
Thomas Massie Dan Bishop

Chairman Member of Congress
Subcommittee on the
Administrative State,
Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust
11
DEP’T OF HOMELAND SEC., DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY CYBERSECURITY AND INFRASTRUCTURE
SECURITY AGENCY BUDGET OVERVIEW FISCAL YEAR 2024 CONGRESSIONAL JUSTIFICATION, at 37 (2023).
12
CISA CYBERSECURITY ADVISORY COMM., supra note 7 at 1.
13
Oversight of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, supra note 1, at 92–93.
14
Foreign Influence Operations and Disinformation, CYBERSECURITY AND INFRASTRUCTURE SEC. AGENCY,
https://www.cisa.gov/topics/election-security/foreign-influence-operations-and-disinformation (last visited Aug. 11,
2023).
August 25, 2023
Page 4
cc: The Honorable Jerrold L. Nadler, Ranking Member

The Honorable Mary Gay Scanlon, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on the Constitution
and Limited Government
The Honorable Lou Correa, Ranking Member, Subcommittee on the Administrative
State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust

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August 25, 2023

The Honorable Alejandro Mayorkas

Dear Secretary Mayorkas:

In response to a question from Representative Bishop about CISA’s practice of flagging

Moreover, during a July 26, 2022, meeting of an advisory subcommittee to CISA,

Finally, in response to Representative Massie’s question asking you to define

Jim Jordan Mike Johnson

Thomas Massie Dan Bishop

cc: The Honorable Jerrold L. Nadler, Ranking Member

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