As critics of the pharmaceutical industry have begun floating the idea of banning direct-to-consumer (DTC) pharmaceutical advertising, the media has largely framed it as a crackdown on “Big Pharma.” But beneath the populist gloss lies a dangerous effort to normalize speech restrictions that should alarm anyone who values the First Amendment or fears such tactics spreading to other sectors, such as energy.

Proponents justify a ban claiming that pharmaceutical ads mislead the public, drive up healthcare costs, and promote products that pose risks to public health. But climate activists have used these exact same arguments in their crusade against America’s most important energy resources.

They have argued that energy companies “mislead the public” by promoting coal, oil, and natural gas without warning that using those resources would somehow cause bad weather events, regardless of science and causation. That argument is the centerpiece of a wave of lawsuits from climate activists in a naked attempt to bankrupt our existing energy industry.

These same activists have argued that refusing to adopt their preferred climate-friendly green technology will “drive up costs” either from the........

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