The news
Fifty days at zero. Then one.
Rep. Michael Rulli (R-OH) introduced the federal GRANITE Act, H.R. 10174, on August 27. For seven weeks it had no cosponsors. On October 15, according to the official record at Congress.gov, Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky added his name. He is still the only one.
Preston Byrne, the lawyer who designed the bill, announced it this afternoon, calling Massie “one of the most principled civil liberties advocates in Congress.”
Very pleased to report that the federal GRANITE Act, H.R. 10174 - a foreign censorship shield bill - has its first cosponsor, one of the most principled civil liberties advocates in Congress: @RepThomasMassie!
— Preston Byrne (@prestonjbyrne) October 16, 2026
A single cosponsor does not pass a bill. This one still matters, and the reason is where Massie sits. GRANITE was referred to the House Judiciary Committee. Massie is on that committee, and on the two subcommittees closest to this bill: the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government, and the Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, Artificial Intelligence, and the Internet, where he is listed first among the Republicans after Chairman Darrell Issa (Office of the Clerk; House Judiciary roster). The bill’s first public supporter is someone who can raise it in the room where it would be marked up.
H.R. 10174 had a sponsor, a committee referral and no other names. A bill with no cosponsors tells committee staff that nobody is asking for it.
A sitting Judiciary member has put his name on it. Other members now have a colleague to follow, and the bill has a supporter inside the committee that would hold a hearing.
The record
Why this signature was not a surprise.
Massie has represented Kentucky’s 4th District since 2012. He is known for casting the lone or near-lone vote against bills both parties support, and for forcing votes that leadership would rather avoid. On free speech, medical choice and government surveillance, the record is long and it is consistent. These are the entries that bear most directly on the work of this coalition.
- Jun 2015The Massie–Lofgren amendment, which defunds the “backdoor” searches of Americans’ emails, photos and texts collected under FISA Section 702, passes the House 255–174 (Massie press release).
- Mar 27, 2020During the CARES Act debate, Massie demands a recorded vote so every member would be on record for the $2.2 trillion package. The Chair refuses (Congress.gov). Both parties and the President attack him for it (Politico).
- May 19, 2021From his official account, Massie posts a study of 187,549 people finding that immunity from prior infection was as effective as the Pfizer vaccine. Twitter labels it “Misleading” (MRC CensorTrack, House record). The government-funded Stanford Virality Project flags his natural-immunity tweets to platforms twice and tags them “right wing” (Shellenberger testimony, Nov 30, 2023).
- 2021“I don’t think anybody should be mandated to take the vaccine,” he tells Kentucky public television (KET / PBS).
- 2022Cosponsors the Protecting Free Speech Act, H.R. 7641, to terminate the Department of Homeland Security’s Disinformation Governance Board and bar any similar board (GovInfo).
- Jan 9, 2023Files H.R. 185 to end the CDC order barring unvaccinated international travelers from entering the U.S. (Massie press release).
- 2023At a Judiciary hearing he questions Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about government efforts to censor natural-immunity “misinformation.” Kennedy’s answer: the word “was a euphemism for any information that departed from government orthodoxies” (Massie newsletter). In November, at the Weaponization subcommittee, he puts his own flagged tweet into the record (Townhall).
- Mar 13, 2024Leads floor opposition to the TikTok divest-or-ban bill, which passes 352–65. “Americans have the right to view information. We don’t need to be protected by the government from information” (McClatchy). He objects that the president should not decide which websites Americans may visit (Massie newsletter).
- May 1, 2024One of 21 Republicans to vote against the Antisemitism Awareness Act, which he opposed on free-speech grounds because it would let political statements be punished on campus (Washington Examiner; Reason).
- 2025Introduces H.R. 1233 to stop taxpayer money from funding “disinformation research” grants (Massie press release). It is in our Policy Blueprint as a bill this coalition supports.
- Jul 15, 2025Introduces the PREP Repeal Act, H.R. 4388, to end the blanket liability shield for pandemic products and restore the right of injured people to sue. “The PREP Act is medical malpractice martial law” (Massie press release).
- Nov 2025His discharge petition forces a vote on the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which passes the House 427–1 and the Senate 100–0 and is signed into law (Massie newsletter).
- Apr 2026“The Constitution requires I vote No on FISA 702 reauthorization” (TechCrunch). An 18-month extension fails 228–197 (New York Post). On April 23 he introduces the Surveillance Accountability Act, H.R. 8470: a warrant for every government search that significantly intrudes on privacy, and a right to sue when the Fourth Amendment is violated (Congress.gov).
- Jun 29, 2026Calls the House kids’ online package “a dangerous anti-privacy bill (identity verification)” for its age-verification mandate (The Maine Wire). See our KOSA feature.
- Oct 15, 2026Becomes the first cosponsor of the GRANITE Act (Congress.gov).
“Americans have the right to view information. We don’t need to be protected by the government from information.”
Rep. Thomas Massie, House floor, March 13, 2024 (McClatchy)The through-line
Three fights, one principle.
Read the record as a whole and it reduces to one idea: the government does not get to decide for you what you may say, read, or put into your body, and when it breaks that rule you should be able to hold it to account in court.
Against the TikTok ban, the Disinformation Governance Board, taxpayer-funded “disinformation” grants and speech codes on campus. Now for GRANITE, which applies the same rule to foreign governments.
Against vaccine mandates and travel bans, and for restoring the right to sue when an emergency product causes harm. He was censored for posting a study on natural immunity.
Warrants for searches, a private right of action for Fourth Amendment violations, recorded votes on spending. The same remedy-first thinking behind our First Amendment Remedies Act.
That last column is the one that connects most closely to Restore the First. Our coalition exists because Americans who were named, flagged and deplatformed during the pandemic had no practical way into court (What is a private right of action?). Massie was flagged by the same kind of government-funded system, and the record of that flagging was entered into the House record. He has been on the receiving end of what this coalition documents in the Targeting Tracker.
In plain English
What the GRANITE Act actually does.
The full name is the Guaranteeing Rights Against Novel International Tyranny and Extortion Act. Byrne describes the design in three parts (prestonbyrne.com):
The shield already partly exists. The 2010 SPEECH Act blocks foreign libel judgments. It does not reach a regulator’s letter, an online-safety fine or a takedown demand, which is how most foreign censorship of Americans now arrives. Byrne explains why existing law left his own clients exposed (GRANITE archive).
Why this is about every American
If you post online, you are already inside other countries’ jurisdiction.
Every website, newsletter and social account can be read abroad, and a growing list of governments claim that makes you subject to their speech laws. These are the cases already on the record:
Britain. Ofcom fined the American site 4chan under the UK Online Safety Act. When 4chan sued in U.S. federal court, the case was dismissed on sovereign immunity, the gap GRANITE closes (Byrne & Storm statement; our cases page).
Russia. A Russian demand sent to the U.S. web host WP Engine was used to block the Human Rights Foundation’s criticism of the Russian government (Russia Censors Americans).
Australia. On October 15, Byrne disclosed that a Royal Commission had targeted him personally, an American lawyer, with a direction that carries up to a year in prison under Australian law (our Byrne feature).
Azerbaijan and China. Foreign states are now bringing lawfare into American courtrooms, including Azerbaijan’s suit against CNN (The Hill).
None of these depend on which party you vote for. “This is not a partisan bill,” Byrne writes (Why Democrats Should Back the GRANITE Act).
This is the argument of our recent feature The Global Front: the First Amendment is American, but the pressure on it now comes from many directions at once, including regulators in London, Brussels, Canberra and Moscow, and the organizations that feed them. Across the Water makes the matching point from the other side. We do not ask other countries to adopt our Constitution. We ask them to stop enforcing their speech laws on American soil, and GRANITE is how Congress would say so in law.
Where it stands
What this means, and what it doesn’t.
Be clear about the limits. The House is out until after the November 3 election. When Congress returns for the lame-duck session, there will be a few weeks before the 119th Congress ends on January 3, 2027. Any bill not passed by then dies and has to be reintroduced.
Massie will not be in the next Congress. He lost his Republican primary on May 19 to Ed Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL backed by President Trump (CNBC). His signature is not a bid for votes. It is a member with less than three months left in office putting his name on the record.
| Bill | Sponsor | Cosponsors (Oct 16) |
|---|---|---|
| H.R. 10174 GRANITE Act | Rep. Rulli (R-OH) | 1 · Massie, Oct 15 (Congress.gov) |
| S. 5478 GRANITE Act | Sen. Lee (R-UT) | 0 · referred to Senate Judiciary Sep 23 (Congress.gov) |
| H.R. 10309 HOMEFRONT Act | Rep. Davidson (R-OH) | 5 · Burchett, Van Drew, Cloud, Taylor, Gosar (Congress.gov) |
The work now is to add names, especially Democrats, so the bill is ready to move quickly when it is reintroduced in January. Every cosponsor added this session is a cosponsor who can be asked to sign the new version. The states are moving faster: Wyoming’s House passed a GRANITE bill 46–12 in February, and its 2027 version cleared committee 4–1 on September 29 (GRANITE archive).
Act now
Make him the first of many.
If you have not yet, send the message to your delegation at the top of this page. Then make the four asks below, and add your name and your story.