Many prominent Republicans in recent years have railed against censorship and espoused a strong belief in free speech principles. Then they got back into power last year and most of those same people did a complete 180 and have been happily supporting censorship of speech that they don't like.

Here is where I would normally ask you:

> Can you name one such individual and give examples of each phenomenon?

But it seems that you conflate "Republicans" who are actually members of government with people who simply support the party; and anyway the concept of "free speech absolutism" is inherently not partisan. The existence of 1A defenders on either side of the aisle (or representing any niche interest) doesn't say anything about the existence of principled, consistent 1A defenders.