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Secretary Rubio's Live Conversation with Mike Benz on Dismantling the Censorship Bureaucracy, April 16, 2025

April 16, 2025 · U.S. Department of State · 0:14:57

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

Secretary of State Marco Rubio held a live conversation with Mike Benz on April 16, 2025, on dismantling the censorship bureaucracy at the State Department, according to the State Department broadcast, which carries the full conversation. The discussion centered on the Department’s Global Engagement Center and the administration’s decision to wind down its counter-disinformation apparatus.

Why it matters

The conversation is Rubio’s fullest on-record explanation of why the Department closed its censorship-related offices — a signature reorganization of his first hundred days, delivered not in a press release but in a public conversation with one of the office’s most prominent outside critics.

Scoreboard watch

The dismantling of the Department’s censorship bureaucracy is a dated administration action stated by the Secretary himself — a candidate for the scoreboard’s government-efficiency record.

Sources: U.S. Department of State, official upload (embedded above). Remarks as delivered; full transcript at state.gov.