Mike Benz: Europeans now call for transparency law in Europe, despite previously threatening sanctions against countries such as Hungary, Georgia for adopting similar legislation

Mike Benz, a former US department of state official and the executive director of the foundation for Freedom Online, on Wednesday claimed that European officials are now calling for a transparency law in Europe, despite previously threatening sanctions against countries such as Hungary and Georgia for adopting similar legislation.

In his interview with Liz Truss, Benz noted that the US State Department’s Office for Public Diplomacy supported initiatives promoting digital freedom of expression in Europe - activities that had been uncontested for decades, but which over the past ten years have increasingly been replaced by the funding of censorship measures instead of free speech.

He further highlighted that the media sphere had reacted with outrage, claiming that such efforts represent a Russian influence operation.

“They argue that the US Government funds groups that support free speech because right-wing populist parties in Europe want freedom of expression to spread their propaganda, and that Russia benefits from their success because these parties are skeptical of NATO and EU actions. Now they claim that Europe needs some kind of transparency law to ensure that every US grant is public. Incidentally, I fully support this. However, just 15 months ago, this very class of European bureaucrats and financial stakeholders were threatening Hungary, Georgia, and three other European countries with sanctions for wanting to adopt exactly such transparency laws. Moreover, they labeled it a ‘Russian law’ because Russia adopted a similar measure in 2012”, Benz said.

He added that Russia itself had no issue with such transparency laws, while the United States and the European Union did.

“The EU even threatened to freeze billions of dollars allocated to Hungary if a parliamentary bill passed that would require any government-funded NGO receiving more than $23,000 to publicly declare it. Why did the United States and the European Union under the Biden administration have a problem with this transparency law? Because they are flooding Hungarian media, NGOs, academia, and civil society with US and EU funds to create an artificial political movement to overthrow [Hungarian Prime Minister] Viktor Orbán, push Ukraine into the EU, and silence the only veto-wielding voice across the entire European Union”, Benz concluded.