WATCH: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Gets ROARING Applause After Powerful Opening Speech On Government Censorship

At his Thursday opening statement over the weaponization of the federal government, presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (D) received roaring applause over his adamant defense of the First Amendment throughout his speech.

The hearing held by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government was looking to specifically address the federal government's push to censor American citizens, specifically looking at its ties with large social media and tech companies in the case of Missouri v. Biden.

Kennedy opened by noting while many other issues are going on in the country at the moment from the ever-increasing cost of groceries to the increasingly messy southern American border, none of that is addressable with the First Amendment. 

“When I gave my speech, my announcement speech in Boston, about two months ago, Youtube– I talked about all those issues,” Kennedy recalled. “I focused on groceries, I focused on the fact that working-class people can no longer afford to live in this country. I talked about inflation, all the issues that deeply concern you, and that you’ve devoted your career to alleviating those issues. Five minutes into my speech when I was talking about Paul Revere, YouTube deplatformed me.”

The Democratic candidate noted how without allowing proper debate, democracy cannot properly function. He noted how many other people are also finding notable problems with censorship and it has been essential throughout America’s history. “The First Amendment was not written for easy speech, it was written for the speech no one likes you for," he said.

“I was censored not just by the Democratic administration, I was censored by the Trump administration. I was the first person censored by, as the chairman pointed out, by the Biden administration two days after he came into office,” Kennedy said. “And by the way, they had to invent a new word called malinformation to censor people like me. There was no misinformation on my Instagram account. Everything I put on that account was cited and sourced, the peer-reviewed publication or government database.”

“No one has ever pointed to a single piece of misinformation I published. I was removed for something they call malinformation,” he continued. “Malinformation is information that is true but is inconvenient to the government that they don’t want people to hear. And as antithetical to the values of our country.”

“After I announced my presidency, it became more difficult for people to censor me outright so now I’m subject to this new form of censorship which is called targeted propaganda,” the presidential candidate stated. “Where people apply pejoratives like anti-vax– I’ve never been anti-vaccine, but everyone in this room probably believes I have been because that’s the prevailing narrative. Anti-semitism, racism. These are the most appalling, disgusting pejoratives and they’re applied to silence me because people don’t want me to have that conversation about the war, about groceries, about inflation, about the war on the middle class in this country that we need to be having.”

Kennedy discussed how the division in this country is currently at an all-time high “since the American Civil War” and that to be able to deal with that division, free speech is needed more than ever. 

“We need to end that polarization. Do you think you can do that by censoring people? I am telling you you cannot, that only aggravates and elevates the problem,” he stated. “We need to start being kind to each other. We need to start being respectful to each other. We need to start restoring the community to this chamber and the rest of America but it has to start here.”

Kennedy noted examples of politicians working alongside one another despite political differences, noting both a current example and a past one of his own family members. He highlighted that these relationships where people discuss and work alongside one another despite immense political differences are the key to a successful democracy and ending polarization as opposed to attempting to censor opposing viewpoints.

The words from RFK Jr. were certainly strong ones. The Democratic candidate has seen his fair share of censorship throughout his life making his fight against it a far more personal one than many other politicians. He also makes a great example of what he preaches, seeing that he actively pushes to appeal to both sides of the aisle and avoids any words or claims that would work to further polarize opposing sides.

Censorship is something the government should not have any hand in and the committee is very well aware of that. Save for a national emergency, there’s no reason any information should be censored, otherwise, what is the point of the First Amendment?