British officials could be barred from entering the United States for infringing the free speech rights of American citizens, under new visa restrictions unveiled by Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
In a move that escalates transatlantic tensions over online expression, Rubio said foreign officials “complicit in censoring” American individuals or media companies would be denied entry. The policy is understood to target regulatory actions taken abroad that, in Washington’s view, violate constitutional protections guaranteed to US citizens.
UK officials are reportedly seeking clarification from the White House following Rubio’s statement, but the measures appear directed at Ofcom, the UK’s communications regulator tasked with enforcing the Online Safety Act (OSA). The legislation has drawn repeated criticism from US officials, who warn it asserts regulatory authority over American platforms in ways incompatible with First Amendment free speech protections.
“For too long, Americans have been fined, harassed, and even charged by foreign authorities for exercising their free speech rights,” Rubio said. “It is unacceptable for foreign officials to issue or threaten arrest warrants on US citizens or US residents for social media posts on American platforms while physically present on US soil.”
He continued: “It is similarly unacceptable for foreign officials to demand that American tech platforms adopt global content moderation policies or engage in censorship activity that reaches beyond their authority and into the US. We will not tolerate encroachments upon American sovereignty, especially when such encroachments undermine the exercise of our fundamental right to free speech.”
The visa restrictions were accompanied by a post from Samuel Samson, a senior adviser at the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL) and an aide to Rubio. Writing on the State Department’s Substack, Samson described Britain and Europe as “a hotbed of digital censorship”. He warned that “Europe’s democratic backsliding not only impacts European citizens but increasingly affects American security and economic ties, along with the free speech rights of American citizens and companies”.
Citing custody data obtained by The Times, Samson pointed out that more than 12,000 people in the UK were arrested in 2023 for online posts, including, he noted, “comments critical of Europe’s migration crisis, that authorities deemed to be ‘grossly offensive’.”
The State Department also recently confirmed it is monitoring the case of Lucy Connolly, a member of the Free Speech Union and the wife of a Conservative councillor, who was sentenced to 31 months for a social media post about the Southport attacks.
These concerns have also been raised through formal diplomatic channels. In March, US diplomats from Samson’s DRL met with Foreign Office officials and raised concerns with Ofcom directly. A spokesperson said the visit aimed to “affirm the importance of freedom of expression in the UK and across Europe”.
At the centre of US objections is the OSA. Passed in October 2023, the law gives Ofcom sweeping enforcement powers, including the ability to fine platforms up to 10 per cent of their global revenue for failing to remove illegal or harmful content. Provisions relating to “illegal content” came into force on 17 March 2025, with Ofcom pledging rigorous enforcement.
Though full implementation is still pending, Ofcom had already assigned 466 staff to ‘online safety’ by July 2024, with further recruitment expected. Under the Act, platforms must conduct risk assessments, remove illegal material, and take “proportionate steps” to mitigate ‘harm’ to users.
Part of the problem is that the law’s reach is not limited to companies based in the UK. Under its extraterritorial provisions, Ofcom may issue compliance notices to services based overseas – including in the US – if they have a significant number of UK users, or target the UK market.
Critics in the US argue that these obligations amount to a de facto censorship regime with extraterritorial reach, one that places UK statutory requirements in direct tension with First Amendment protections. Rubio alluded to such concerns in his remarks: “In some instances, foreign officials have taken flagrant censorship actions against US tech companies and US citizens and residents when they have no authority to do so.”
One of the clearest flashpoints is the case of Gab, a US-based platform with an estimated five million registered users, which has long positioned itself as a haven for unrestricted political speech.
On 16 March, Ofcom formally notified Gab that it fell within the scope of the Online Safety Act and was required to submit an “illegal harm risk assessment” by the end of the month. Non-compliance, the regulator warned, could trigger a substantial fine as well as a blocking order.
Gab responded with a public refusal. “We will not comply. We will not pay one cent,” the company’s CEO, Andrew Torba, wrote. “Our latest threatening letter from Ofcom ordered us to disclose information about our users and operations. We know where this leads: compelled censorship and British citizens are thrown in jail for ‘hate speech’. We refuse to comply with this tyranny.”
The company’s legal team echoed that position, arguing that because it operates exclusively in the US, it is protected by the First Amendment. “The most fundamental of America’s laws – the First Amendment to our Constitution – ensures Gab’s right to provide a service that allows anyone, anywhere, to receive and impart political opinions of any kind, free from state interference, on its US-based servers,” they said.
Following Ofcom’s subsequent demand for user data, Gab blocked access to its platform for UK users, in a move intended to avoid falling within the regulator’s jurisdiction.
The dispute has sharpened long-simmering tensions between the UK and US governments. While Ofcom’s technocrats continue to frame the OSA as a tool to protect users from online ‘harms’, US Republicans increasingly see it as part of a broader shift toward digital censorship. That perception appears to be hardening – and in Rubio’s case, has now triggered retaliatory action.
There’s more on this story here.
