So much has happened in the world over the past few months that many of us have probably already forgotten what took place in Romania at the end of 2024: the first round of the presidential election was annulled after the right-wing candidate, Kalin Georgescu, surprisingly won. The official reason given was alleged Russian interference via the TikTok platform. The election was repeated in May 2025 and the candidate favoured by the EU establishment won.
Meanwhile, the preliminary report by the Republicans in the US House of Representatives demonstrates the matter in a completely different light. The document is based on internal emails and posts on platforms such as TikTok, Meta and Google. According to the Republicans’ findings, the European Commission is believed to have demanded the removal of content criticising the Romanian government and promoting Georgescu, including all material featuring his image. Furthermore, TikTok informed the EU that no evidence of coordinated Russian interference had been found. It seems more likely that it was Brussels that promoted a left-wing candidate in order to reduce the chances of victory for their main rival in the repeat elections, George Simion. The European Commission naturally considers these allegations to be unfounded and absurd. It comes as no surprise that any defendant who finds himself cornered will defend himself vigorously.
The aforementioned report by the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee indicates that the European Union has interfered in elections in at least eight Member States. Political content that was incompatible with the left-wing narrative was even censored immediately before the elections. The target was any content associated with conservatism or criticising EU policy. Let us mention just the most significant violations:
[1] Slovakia: Shortly before the 2023 parliamentary elections, the EU forced social media platforms to change their moderation policies and remove certain content. Statements such as “There are only two genders” are now to be classified as hate speech.
[2] Netherlands: Ahead of the 2023 elections and during the 2025 election campaign, the EU collaborated with the Dutch regulatory authority (ACM) and European left-wing non-governmental organisations (NGOs). These NGOs were designated as “trusted flagging organisations”. As soon as such an organisation reports a post as harmful, the administrators of platforms such as Facebook must respond immediately.
[3] Ireland: The report shows how the local regulatory authority (Coimisiún on Meán) used binding ‘risk assessment’ reports ahead of the last elections. The platforms were forced to define right-wing (often anti-immigrant) narratives as a threat to electoral integrity. This, in turn, was intended to lead the tech giants to remove the content as a preventive measure.
These measures taken by the EU were so successful because, under the EU Digital Services Act (DSA), failing to address reports of illegal content or lacking appropriate moderation mechanisms can result in a fine of up to 6% of a company’s total global annual turnover. Large companies such as TikTok, Meta or Google are not going to risk that much money in the name of media freedom. That is why such widespread censorship was possible in the first place.
Freedom of expression and the EU – these are two incompatible concepts.
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