Utah Senator Mike Lee announced he will soon introduce groundbreaking legislation to restore the original protections of the Smith-Mundt Act—and he’s renaming it the “Charlie Kirk Act” in honor of the conservative leader assassinated just days ago.
“In the coming days, I’ll be filing my previously drafted legislation to restore Smith-Mundt, and renaming it the Charlie Kirk Act. Domestic, political, government-funded propaganda must end now,” Lee wrote on X.
In the coming days, I’ll be filing my previously drafted legislation to restore Smith-Mundt, and renaming it the Charlie Kirk Act
Domestic, political, government-funded propaganda must end now https://t.co/lm49zS24tX
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) September 15, 2025
This marks one of the most aggressive steps yet to dismantle the Deep State’s stranglehold on information flow in America.
Passed in 1948, the Smith–Mundt Act (officially the United States Information and Educational Exchange Act) allowed the U.S. government to conduct foreign propaganda campaigns, radio, film, exchanges, cultural outreach, aimed at influencing foreign populations during the Cold War.
But the law contained one critical safeguard: propaganda made for foreign audiences was forbidden from being used inside the United States. Washington could not psy-op its own people. This firewall stood for more than six decades.
In 2012, tucked into the National Defense Authorization Act for FY2013, Congress passed the Smith–Mundt Modernization Act, introduced by Representative Mac Thornberry (R-TX) and signed by Barack Obama on January 2, 2013.
It shredded the firewall and legalized domestic distribution of State Department and U.S. Agency for Global Media (formerly Broadcasting Board of Governors) materials.
By July 2, 2013, it was official: U.S. citizens could now be subjected to the same government-crafted propaganda once reserved for foreigners.
Seven months ago, investigative watchdog Mike Benz revealed to Joe Rogan in an interview what really happened with the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act of 2012.
Obama’s “modernization” wasn’t modernization at all; it was the effective repeal of Smith–Mundt, a deliberate move to unleash the State Department, CIA, and USAID’s propaganda weapons on the American people.
According to Benz, it allowed the permanent “Department of Dirty Tricks” to:
Infiltrate and co-opt universities, unions, media, politicians, and judges.
Fund groups abroad that also operate here, laundering foreign “grants” into domestic propaganda.
Push censorship by coercing foreign governments to pass laws that attack U.S. free speech and social media.
Mike Benz:
Are you familiar with the Smith–Mundt Act?
Joe Rogan:
Is that the 2011, 2012 thing where Obama allowed people to use propaganda against United States citizens?
Mike Benz:
Yeah. What was done then under Obama was the effective repeal of it. It was called the Smith–Mundt Modernization Act. But the modernization got rid of the whole purpose of it—the firewall—because at the time, the media and media control was seen as the linchpin, the crux of winning the Cold War: piping in pro-U.S. media influence.
Because everything moved after World War II from kinetic warfare and military occupation—we used to militarily occupy the Philippines, for example, after we won the Spanish–American War—but that was banned under international law. Territorial acquisition by military force in 1948 was outlawed. So, we had to win elections, and we had to influence the passage of laws in foreign countries by having an apparatus inside those countries that influenced the hearts and minds of people, which determined who they voted for, which then determined the government. You had to move towards political vassalage rather than military occupation.
What the Smith–Mundt Act did—simultaneous with its creation in 1948—was recognize the Frankensteinian monster Congress was authorizing by creating a covert permanent Department of Dirty Tricks (their phrase, not mine). Its job was to cloak, infiltrate, and co-opt the universities, the unions, the media, the politicians, the judges—the whole sworn army—what I’ve been calling for a long time the “USAID Truman Show.” Because people in foreign countries had no idea how many of the things they interacted with were effectively a movie set being constructed by the U.S. State Department and its sister influence organizations.
Mike Benz:
But the point I’m getting at here is the Smith–Mundt Act in 1948 said, “Okay, you guys can do this. State Department can do this. CIA can do this. USAID, when it came along 13 years later, could do this.”
There was a guy named Frank Wisner, one of the godfathers of the CIA. He created what was called “Wisner’s Wurlitzer,” like a church organ. He bragged that he could play the international media like a symphony, making any narrative go viral anywhere in the world because of the CIA’s proprietary media functions and its distribution network—especially when the U.S. first moved for advantage in radio and print. It was basically the U.S. and U.K., the only real games in town, in having robust radio, film, TV, and print media.
Smith–Mundt said, “Okay, you can do that abroad. You can plant fake news stories in France. You can pump propaganda into Africa, Western Europe, Central Asia. But it can’t come home. You can’t psy-op our own people with your propaganda organ abroad. Because the point of authorizing this is that we get cheaper gas, import–export markets, and a higher standard of living.”
Mike Benz:
If a foreign government doesn’t want to give up its resources, allow a U.S. military base, or allow joint partnerships or multinational corporations to operate there, then the American people suffer economically. It was always designed to say, “Listen, you can do this dirty stuff abroad, but it can’t come home.”
Even that protection—which lasted for 70 years and we only lost a decade ago—is gone. And now we’re up against a much deeper, darker problem with this USAID scandal, and soon with scandals breaking open at the Pentagon and State Department.
Because the issue isn’t just a Smith–Mundt problem of propaganda—it’s about funding and operations. The Blob, our foreign policy establishment, can fund groups that effectively work with prosecutors domestically, or with media, under “dual use.” We give them foreign grants to do propaganda abroad, but they operate here. Or they enforce social media censorship abroad that ends up being applied here, coercing countries to pass censorship laws explicitly designed to hit U.S. peer-to-peer speech.
We need that protection. If we’re going to keep this function at all, we need a hard firewall and absolute, grotesque penalties for any violation.
WATCH:
The Smith-Mundt Act is trending on X, don’t let this momentum die
We must Restore the Smith Mundt Act and call it The Charlie Kirk Act to end legalized mainstream media propaganda
Mike Benz talks with Joe Rogan about what Barack Obama really did by repealing the Smith–Mundt Act… pic.twitter.com/atptn5OCj3
— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) September 14, 2025
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