The Trump administration has not revealed which administrations were targeted by compiling social media posts that the Biden administration’s State Department has identified as “disinformation providers” compiled as “disinformation.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio revealed that an unidentified Trump administration official was present at the latest Trump administration ministerial meeting on April 30, as he was subject to State Department documents detailing allegations of promoting social media “disinformation.”
Rubio, the State Department and the White House have yet to determine which civil servants the Biden administration has targeted. Fox News Digital has repeatedly contacted the White House about the identity of officials, including Monday, but has not received a reply.
When sought updates on the identity of Trump officials, the State Department digitally directed Fox News to Rubio’s April 30 remarks, detailing, “We intend to hand over these documents to individuals and they will decide whether or not they want to disclose them.”
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The Trump administration has not revealed which administrations were targeted by compiling social media posts that the Biden administration’s State Department has identified as “disinformation providers” compiled as “disinformation.” (Getty Images)
At a Cabinet meeting on April 30, Rubio said that an unrepeated office within the State Department, known as the Global Engagement Center (GEC), had compiled disinformation documents for Americans across the country as part of an effort to “censor” individuals, including individuals who joined the Trump administration.
“We had an office in the State Department, which was about censoring Americans,” Rubio said during the meeting. “And by the way, I’m not going to say who it is. I’ll leave it to them. Today, at least one person had relevant documents at this table to build social media posts and identify them as disinformation providers. We have these related parties. We’ll hand them over to these individuals.”
Vice President JD Vance asked, “Was it me or Elon (Musk)? I can follow up when the media is gone,” and drew laughs from the cabinet.
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Secretary of State Marco Rubio will speak at the cabinet meeting on April 30th.
“But think about that. The US State Department has established an office to monitor social media posts and commentaries of American citizens and identify them as vectors of disinformation,” Rubio continued. “When you know that freedom of speech and transparency is the best way to fight disinformation.”
Rubio did not specify which Trump officials were protecting the Biden administration, but Elon Musk had previously opposed the global engagement center.
“The worst criminals in US government censorship and media manipulation have been posted to X by Musk, posted to X in January 2023. This became the administration’s equipment in a temporary role in the Department of Government Efficiency, more than a year before Musk supported Trump in the 2024 presidential election.
“They are a threat to our democracy,” Musk added.
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Former President Barack Obama established the Global Engagement Centre in 2016 through an executive order aimed at coordinating terrorism messages to foreign countries before expanding scope to combat foreign propaganda and disinformation, State Department documents show.
Conservatives denounced the office as a political weapon to silence free speeches, including Rubio in the April OP-ED, when “Russian disinformation device” cited a 2020 GEC report claiming that the coronavirus was a “designed bioweapon.”
At a Cabinet meeting on April 30, Marco Rubio said that the undone office within the State Department, known as the Global Engagement Centre (GEC), has compiled disinformation documents for Americans across the country as part of an effort to “censor” their free speeches. (Celal Gunes/Anadolu Agency)
Over the years following the pandemic, the Department of Energy and former FBI director Christopher Ray under the Biden administration, said evidence that COVID-19 was the result of lab leaks, that the Trump administration’s CIA reported early in 2025 that lab leaks were likely the origin of the virus.
Twitter boss Elon Musk has accused the agency of being “the worst criminal in US government censorship.”
In 2024, lawmakers did not approve new funds for the National Defense License Act office and were scheduled to end on December 23, 2024. However, the Biden administration shuffled staff and rebranded the office.
The New York Post became the counter’s foreign information manipulation and intervention hub just days before Trump’s inauguration, reported in January.
Rubio announced in April that the office would officially shutter.
Marco Rubio opposed the office in previous interviews and Op-Eds, including writing a Federalist opinion in April, touting that he was demolishing a “censorship industrial complex” that captured agencies such as the State Department. (via Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg Getty Images)
“We are announcing the closure of the State Department’s counter foreign information manipulation and interference (R/FIMI), previously known as the Global Engagement Centre (GEC),,” Rubio said in a statement announcing the closure of its offices in a statement on April 16th.
“Under previous administrations, taxpayers spend millions of dollars on this office, which cost more than $50 million a year, actively silence and censor the voices of Americans they are supposed to serve,” he wrote. “This is in conflict with the very principles that we should support and that it appears to have been in America. That’s over today.”
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Marco Rubio had not identified which Trump officials were keeping relevant documents, but Elon Musk had previously opposed the global engagement center. (Alex Brandon/Applications)
Rubio opposed the office, including writing a federalist opinion in April, and touting that he was demolishing the “censored industrial complex” that had captured agencies such as the State Department.
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“In the past six months, bodies like the GEC have been created by our own ruling and ruling class, almost destroying America’s long history of freedom of speech,” he writes in OP-ED. “The enemy of speech had new jargon to justify their authoritarian impulses: “disinformation” promoted by malicious foreign governments, which was the primary threat to “our democracy.” This “disinformation” had to be identified and engraved in order to protect “our democracy.” ”
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