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Free Speech

Elite Panic and the Push to Regulate "Misinformation"

European leaders' warnings of a democratic apocalypse failed to materialize in 2024.

Jacob Mchangama and Jeff Kosseff | 5.5.2026 9:36 AM

Our book traces the waves of elite panic that drive governments to regulate "misinformation," "disinformation," and other speech that the leaders believe are not in the best interests of the public. One wave of elite panic reached its peak in 2024. It was a pivotal year for the future of global democracy, as some 2 billion voters—about half the adult population of the globe—went to the polls, including voters in the United States, the European Union, France, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa, Taiwan, Mexico, and India.

Despite a record number of eligible voters, the mood among many politicians, commentators, and media institutions was more fearful than celebratory. A New York Times article from January 2024 warned that "false narratives and conspiracy theories have evolved into an increasingly global menace," and that "artificial intelligence has supercharged disinformation efforts and distorted perceptions of reality." Experts cautioned that the combination of online influence campaigns and artificial intelligence had created a "perfect storm of disinformation" that threatened free and fair elections.

The EU-funded European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) warned that disinformation campaigns had become "a pervasive phenomenon," with more voters exposed than ever before. An anonymous senior EU official highlighted the threat from "tsunami levels" of disinformation: "It's as if we have been infected by this foreign interference. It's a silent killer." Not to be outdone, Věra Jourová, the European Commission's vice president for values and transparency, said AI deepfakes of politicians could create "an atomic bomb … to change the course of voter preferences." To counter this threat, the European Commission sent menacing letters to social media platforms and dispatched crisis units, expecting to deal with attempts to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the election's outcome for weeks after the vote.

At the Copenhagen Democracy Summit in May 2024, just a month before the European Parliamentary elections, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the........

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