WASHINGTON—The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University and Protect Democracy today filed a lawsuit in federal court on behalf of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research (CITR) challenging the constitutionality of a new U.S. immigration policy that targets noncitizen researchers, advocates, fact-checkers, and trust and safety workers for visa denials, revocations, detention, and deportation based on their work researching and reporting on social media platforms. The group alleges that the policy, which purportedly aims to combat “censorship” of Americans’ speech on the internet, violates the First Amendment and chills independent research about social media and other internet platforms.

“The Trump administration is using the threat of detention and deportation to suppress speech it disfavors,” said Carrie DeCell, senior staff attorney and legislative advisor at the Knight First Amendment Institute. “By targeting researchers and advocates for their work studying and reporting on social media platforms and online harms, the policy chills protected speech and distorts public debate about issues of profound public importance.”

Since his first term, President Trump and his allies have characterized the content moderation decisions of privately owned social media platforms as a form of “censorship” reflecting anti-conservative bias. In May 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a visa restriction policy aimed at foreign officials and other individuals who are allegedly “complicit in censoring Americans.” In early December 2025, news outlets reported that the State Department had instructed U.S. consular officers to scrutinize visa applicants—particularly H-1B applicants—for evidence of their work in fields including misinformation, disinformation, fact-checking, content moderation, trust and safety, and compliance, and to pursue findings of visa ineligibility if they deemed applicants “complicit” in censorship. Secretary Rubio subsequently applied the policy to one former EU regulator and four independent researchers and advocates—including the leaders of two CITR-member organizations—and indicated his willingness to expand its application. 

CITR’s members include research organizations, academics, journalists, and advocates who study digital platforms and their societal impacts. Their work seeks to identify online harms, improve user safety, and inform public debate.

“Researchers who help everyday people understand the impacts of Big Tech are scared that they and their families will be targeted for detention and deportation under this policy,” said Brandi Geurkink, executive director of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research. “At a time when AI is rapidly changing our lives and economy and people are already worried about their freedom and safety online, we need independent researchers more than ever. This policy is meant to censor researchers into silence and keep the public in the dark, and that’s exactly what it’s doing.”

The policy’s chilling effects spread beyond the community of independent researchers that CITR represents. According to news reports about the December 2025 State Department cable, which has not been made public, the policy reaches fact-checkers and online safety professionals whose work includes combating child exploitation, terrorism, and preventing fraud, human trafficking, and other forms of malicious behavior. This work involves research, analysis, and editorial judgment—work that is itself protected expressive activity. 

“This policy appears to be so broad and vague that it casts a shadow over a vast range of protected activity,” said Naomi Gilens, counsel at Protect Democracy. “The professionals working to keep the internet safe are left in fear, wondering whether doing their jobs could cost them their visas or trigger detention or deportation. Exploiting immigration policy to go after this kind of work doesn’t just hurt those individuals—it undermines the very systems that make the internet more trustworthy for all of us.”

Today’s complaint further alleges that the policy punishes CITR’s noncitizen members and others based on their perceived viewpoints; interferes with the rights of CITR and its U.S. citizen members to hear from and associate with noncitizen colleagues; is not sufficiently tailored to serve any legitimate governmental interest; and is impermissibly vague. The complaint also raises claims under the Administrative Procedure Act.

Read the complaint here.

Read more about the lawsuit, Coalition for Independent Technology Research v. Rubio, here.

Lawyers on the case include Carrie DeCell, Raya Koreh, Kiran Wattamwar, Anna Diakun, Katie Fallow, Alex Abdo, and Jameel Jaffer, for the Knight First Amendment Institute, and Naomi Gilens, Nicole Schneidman, Scott Shuchart, and Deana El-Mallawany, for Protect Democracy. 

For more information, contact: Adriana Lamirande, [email protected]