How Taxpayer-Funded Censorship Tools Could Manipulate What Americans See About Vaccines, Raw Milk, And More

The U.S. government funded various online censorship tools, some of which went missing after President Donald Trump took office. Others, however, are still operating today — potentially limiting what Americans see online, especially regarding health issues.

The National Science Foundation incubated a host of programs through its Convergence Accelerator to fight online speech deemed “misinformation,” many of which recently dropped off the map, as The Federalist previously reported. But some of these projects continue today — adopted by left-leaning institutions and dedicated to controlling online speech.

The censorship projects still operating include Chime In, hosted by the University of Wisconsin-Madison; the Analysis and Response Toolkit for Trust, housed in leftist nonprofit Discourse Labs; and Expert Voices Together, adopted by the left-wing group Right To Be. 

Chime In

The tool Chime In was previously called “Course Correct.” UW-Madison developed Course Correct as an anti-“misinformation” dashboard for journalists, as The Federalist previously reported. The NSF awarded the project $5 million starting in 2022. According to the grant description, it hoped to “scale Course Correct into local, national, and international newsrooms…” 

The program was renamed to Chime In “more than a year ago,” university spokesman John Lucas previously told The Federalist. Chime In is housed in UW-Madison’s Center for Communication and Civic Renewal, and aims to “counter vaccine hesitancy.”

As The College Fix reported in 2023, the program conducted “pilot testing… on issues including: raw milk, genetically modified foods, vaccine safety, fluoride in water, Covid-19, and sunscreen safety.” The project could also collude with media to manipulate the public narrative.

“Once journalists evaluate the size and reach of these misinformation networks detected by the dashboard, they work with Course Correct staff to develop and rapidly test messages that will reduce the flow of misinformation,” reads the project’s NSF description. “Course Correct will seed the affected misinformation network with sponsored social media posts…”

The Federalist obtained a screen recording of the Chime In software. The program helps users create messaging “experiments,” creating their own target groups, such as “vaccine skeptics.” Users can push their narratives on different platforms such as X, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, then request funding for these campaigns. Finally, the tool enables users to draft specific posts to be promoted across social media.

Chime In “avoid[s] content moderation,” university spokesman Greg Bump previously claimed to The Federalist, but he admitted the program “promotes independently verified facts into at-need networks using the sponsored content systems of social media. …” So Chime In could help flood targeted social media with left-wing content.

Analysis and Response Toolkit for Trust

The ARTT program developed the ARTT Guide chatbot — an artificial intelligence, “Web-based software assistant that provides a framework of possible responses” for political discussions, as The Federalist previously reported, specifically focusing on “questions around vaccines.”

ARTT was “established through funding and support through the National Science Foundation’s Convergence Accelerator,” and the NSF awarded it nearly $750,000 starting in 2021. The project was also given $5 million to “develop practical interventions to build trust and address vaccine hesitancy.” 

ARTT planned to partner with the University of Washington’s Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering, Wikimedia DC, Social Science Research Council, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. The hospital is infamous for performing transgender surgeries on and administering opposite-sex hormones to minors. ARTT has also taken “advising” from the World Health Organization’s “Vaccine Safety Net.”

The project was led by Hacks/Hackers,  a nonprofit “meetup for journalists and technologists.” The group works with powerful institutions, including the World Economic Forum (WEF), Wikimedia Foundation, Google, Mozilla, and Meta. It takes funding from the left-wing Google News Initiative, MacArthur Foundation, and Craig Newmark Philanthropies, which pushes “left-of-center journalism,” according to InfluenceWatch.

The group recently “graduat[ed] from “startup mode” in the NSF’s Convergence Accelerator, according to the group’s website, launching its own nonprofit — Discourse Labs, which lists Hacks/Hackers among its “Partners/Funders.”

According to the group’s website, Discourse Labs works with “researchers, computer scientists, educators, democracy and conflict resolution specialists, Wikimedians, health science communicators, and others” to sway “social conversations.” Its “Principals and Board” include Connie Moon Sehat, a former WEF fellow; Mark Coatney, Forbes’ former vice president of digital news; University of Washington Professor Franziska Roesner, and Assistant Professor Amy Zhang.

“Discourse Labs is a nonprofit with the mission of developing tools and resources for productive public dialogue, which includes the Analysis and Response Toolkit for Trust (ARTT),” a representative for Discourse Labs previously told The Federalist. The nonprofit has not yet posted tax documents online that disclose any new funding sources.

Expert Voices Together

Faculty from multiple universities developed Expert Voices Together, a “rapid-response system” for “journalists and researchers,” as The Federalist previously reported. The program could compromise press independence, as according to the EVT website, it arranges for “trained support coordinators” to “meet 1:1 with journalists and researchers.”

The NSF Convergence Accelerator awarded EVT nearly $750,000 starting in 2021, and $5 million starting in 2022. Faculty from George Washington University, Columbia University, Louisiana State University, the University of Georgia, and the University of South Carolina led the project, according to its website. 

EVT became “housed” at the leftist group Right To Be this year. The group provides training on radical topics including “Bystander Intervention To Support The LGBTQIA+ Community,” “Conflict De-Escalation In Protest Spaces,” and “Bystander Intervention To Stop Police Sponsored Violence and Anti-Black Racism.” Right To Be partnered with leftist Craig Newmark Philanthropies and the International Women’s Media Foundation, which gave an award to a terrorism supporter. 

A representative from Right To Be previously told The Federalist EVT “remains under the direction of George Washington University,” and to “direct inquiries there.” At the time, GWU had not responded to requests for comment.

So the NSF incubated censorship groups, which have since been adopted by left-leaning institutions and nonprofits to manipulate public discourse. These are more instances of the federal government using taxpayers’ dollars to create privately controlled programs targeting citizens’ speech.

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Logan Washburn is a staff writer covering election integrity. He is a spring 2025 fellow of The College Fix. He graduated from Hillsdale College, served as Christopher Rufo’s editorial assistant, and has bylines in The Wall Street Journal, The Tennessean, and The Daily Caller. Logan is from Central Oregon but now lives in rural Michigan.

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