The Free Press Goes to Washington to Defend Free Speech

I met Rupa Subramanya on Twitter (now X) in early 2022. It was during the Canadian truckers’ protest, and she seemed to be one of the only people actually trying to understand what was going on: Why were these people so angry? Were they really revolting over a Covid vaccine mandate? And why, despite the fact that the protesters were from every walk of life, was the legacy press insisting that they were driven by bigotry?

Rupa had the sensibility and mindset of a great reporter: curious, astute, open-minded, incisive—and disinclined to believe groupthink.

So, I messaged her. What do you think about writing something for us? 

That led to Rupa’s first piece for The Free Press: What the Truckers Want.

In her story, she wrote: “​​I live in downtown Ottawa, within view of Parliament Hill, and have spent the past 10 days or so bundled up and walking around the protests. I have spoken to close to 100 protesters, truckers and other folks, and not one of them sounded like an insurrectionist, white supremacist, racist, or misogynist.” She also found that the truckers, the vast majority of whom were actually vaccinated, were really protesting about something else: “A sense that they are being ganged up on by the government, the media, Big Tech, Big Pharma.”

Since then, Rupa has reported for The Free Press on state-sanctioned euthanasia and race-based criminal sentencing in Canada. She exposed the “giant grift” that is ESG and how PayPal has become a cornerstone of our emerging social credit system. She flew to Virginia and got the first big interview with country phenom Oliver Anthony. She’s written about the end of affirmative action, and, of course, Justin Trudeau’s war on internet freedom.

If there’s one theme that runs through Rupa’s work it is this: the urgent threat to our liberties by the combined power of government and Big Tech.

It’s hard to think of a more urgent subject than that one at the moment. Which is why we felt it was so important to fly Rupa down to Washington late last week to testify at a House of Representatives hearing on free expression. 

Watch her impassioned testimony here. It’s seven minutes long and worth watching with your children. (She also appeared on Fox and Newsmax.)

This is the second time a Free Press reporter has headed to the capital in recent weeks. Our intern, Julia Steinberg, offered powerful testimony before Congress on the rise of antisemitism on college campuses.

This is all to say: we are a small team, but our impact is enormous. 

So if you believe in our work and want to make sure The Free Press is here to stay, please become a paid subscriber today.

—BW