American broadcaster CBS followed German police as they raided homes for speech crimes, such as posting a “racist cartoon” on the internet, which prosecutors in the country defended as a supposedly necessary safeguard to protect democracy.

Just days after U.S. Vice President JD Vance lambasted Germany and other European states for failing to live up to Western ideals of liberty, particularly on the issue of free speech, CBS’s 60 Minutes news magazine broadcast footage of police raids over social media posts and interviews with prosecutors defending the draconian practice.

“It’s 6:01 on a Tuesday morning, and we were with state police as they raided this apartment in Northwest Germany. Inside six armed officers searched a suspect’s home, then seized his laptop and cellphone. Prosecutors say those electronics may have been used to commit a crime, the crime; posting a racist cartoon online,” 60 Minutes anchor Sharyn Alfonsi described.

Unlike the United States, where the First Amendment protects citizens from being arrested over so-called “hate speech”, it is a very different story in Germany.

Local prosecutors told the American broadcaster that there are currently 16 dedicated police task forces monitoring “hate speech” on the German web, with around 3,500 cases per year. Prosecutor Frank-Michael Laue told the news programme that his unit alone has successfully secured 750 speech crime convictions over the past four years. (Read more from “German Police Raid Homes Over Online ’Hate Speech’ Posts” HERE)

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