IFCN: U.S. Visa Guidance Targeting Fact-Checkers Threatens Press Freedom and Online Safety

The International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) is deeply alarmed by reports that the U.S. State Department has instructed consular officers to refuse visas to people who have worked in fact-checking, content moderation, or trust-and-safety roles.

Fact-checking is journalism. It involves comparing public claims against the best available evidence and publishing the results openly so the public can assess them. This practice strengthens public debate rather than suppressing it. In the United States, these activities are protected by the First Amendment, and the U.S. has historically promoted comparable press freedoms abroad. To equate fact-checking with censorship is either a misunderstanding of the profession or a deliberate mischaracterization.

The IFCN’s global network comprises more than 170 verified signatories in over 80 countries, all committed to nonpartisanship, transparency of sources, and issuing corrections when errors occur. These standards reflect long-established principles of high-quality journalism. Importantly, IFCN signatories do not remove content from the internet; they add verified information and context to the public record.

We are also concerned about the broader implications for trust-and-safety professionals whose work protects children from exploitation, prevents fraud and scams, and combats coordinated harassment. Those functions help make online spaces safer for everyone, including U.S. users. Both platform moderation and journalistic fact-checking are expressions of freedom of speech and public-interest reporting.

"Policies that treat the pursuit of accuracy as a disqualifying activity send a chilling message to journalists and other professionals worldwide."

A free press and an informed public are foundational to democratic societies. Policies that penalize people for pursuing accuracy risk undermining global reporting, chilling cross-border collaboration, and weakening online safety efforts.

About the IFCN

The IFCN at the Poynter Institute was launched in 2015 to unite the growing global community of fact-checkers and advocates for accurate public information in the fight against misinformation. We support fact-checkers through networking, capacity-building, collaborative projects, advocacy, training and global events. Our team monitors trends in the fact-checking field, provides resources to practitioners, informs public discourse, and supports initiatives that strengthen accountability in journalism.

(This statement was originally published by the International Fact-Checking Network.)