Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke at the World Forum in Berlin this week and said: “There’s no way to sugarcoat it, there’s no way to explain it way, autocracy is on the march. We now have a government in the United States that has thrown in its lot with autocrats.”
The 2016 Democratic presidential nominee added that the current U.S. government has “given enormous power to the men who control the information flow in our world, who have all pledged allegiance to the continuation of algorithms that not only addict us but poison us with hatred and fear.”
Clinton added: “Information determines how we think and how we think determines what we say and what we say determines what we do.”
Hillary Clinton finding comfort with fellow globalists in Germany today: “We now have a government in the United States that has thrown in its lot with the autocrats.”
— Eric Schmitt (@Eric_Schmitt) March 19, 2025
She’s speaking in a country where it’s illegal to insult politicians online.
pic.twitter.com/LklvJU10wh
MAGA-aligned U.S. Senator Eric Schmitt (R-Missouri) responded to Clinton’s speech on X by writing: “Hillary Clinton finding comfort with fellow globalists in Germany today… She’s speaking in a country where it’s illegal to insult politicians online.”
KCUR’s metro reporter Sam Zeff replied to Schmitt: “Not exactly,” and provided a link to the Library of Congress which outlines the “Limits on Freedom of Expression: Germany,” as noted in the German Constitution, which protects free speech but not “hate speech.” (Article 5 of the German Basic Law, the country’s constitution, “guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of the press, among other enumerated communication rights.)
[Note: Without being criticized by Schmitt for globalist views, Vice President JD Vance also spoke in Germany recently, attending the Munich Security Conference where he criticized Germany for adopting a “Soviet”-style approach to censorship.]
Schmitt, Vance, and Zeff are referring to the ongoing free speech vs. hate speech battle — magnified by the power of the internet — that 60 Minutes explored in a recent segment about German authorities who have started to prosecute online trolls, “in an effort to curb online hate speech in Germany.”
German prosecutors explain to American viewers on 60 Minutes all the various ways the country criminalizes speech, such as online insults, holocaust denial and reposting fake news. pic.twitter.com/ESc1zvivX1
— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) February 17, 2025
Three German prosecutors interviewed by 60 Minutes said it is a crime in Germany to insult someone in public and online — and it is also a crime to repost an insult online. (When asked, “Is it a crime to insult somebody in public?” all three prosecutors said “Yes.” When asked, “It’s a crime to insult them online as well?” they agreed again, “Yes.” One prosecutor added that reposting an insult “is a crime as well.”)
[NOTE: A notable — and not new — example of the free speech vs. hate speech argument is seen in the fact that it is illegal in Germany to perform the Sieg Heil — or the Nazi — salute, which has been in the news lately.]
In Germany, posting hate speech online is illegal. The law is enforced with pre-dawn police raids. https://t.co/DNAJyNxILt pic.twitter.com/OHvWTVaRjQ
— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) February 17, 2025
Germany ramped up its “hate speech” laws after the 2019 murder of a local politician who defended then Chancellor Angela Merkel‘s progressive immigration policies in a video that went viral in 2015.
One of the prosecutors said that for four years people online were inciting others to kill the politician. She said: “That was one of the cases where we see that online hate can sometimes find a way into real life and then hurt people.”
Far-right American conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who made false claims that the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, which killed 20 students and six educators in Newtown, Connecticut, was a hoax, responded to the segment by writing: “Watch 60 Minutes News Have A Political Orgasm Over The German Government Arresting Citizens For Their Speech.”
Parents of the children who were murdered at Sandy Hook successfully sued Jones and said they were subjected to “years of torment, threats and abuse by people who believed the lies he told on his show.” Jones was permanently banned by Twitter in 2018 and then reinstated in 2023 by its new owner, Elon Musk.
