As you say, the commitment to basic democratic rights is considerably stronger in other western countries than in the US. The kind of abuses the Republican party habitually conducts with the aim of disenfranchising Democratic voters would not be tolerated elsewhere; this is reflected by the fact that the US constitution only explicitly prohibits certain forms of electoral discrimination (i.e. it's a blacklist policy) but does not explicitly grant a right to vote.
1) Post an approving image of weed on Facebook
2) Write ACAB on Twitter (this one also got a journalist arrested)
3) Have a shirt that says "ruling party - thieves" (which, as an aside, is pretty accurate)
4) Are a journalist and publish an article which the court rules has caused "mental pain" to suing party (usually politicians and judges - this happens all the time)
You are delusional to think the European media is freer.
The U.S. ranks 45th in press freedoms. There are 25 European countries who rank better. Heck, there are even 5 African countries who rank higher.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Press_Freedom_Index
This infamous clip from The Newsroom might shed more light on how the U.S. is actually doing in comparison to other democratic countries (all statistics quoted are easily verified if you want to look into it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTjMqda19wk
“Yes you have fewer free speech rights in Europe and Canada but that doesn’t actually matter”
https://www.ips-journal.eu/topics/european-union/voter-suppr...
Practically speaking, there is no differences in the freedom Canadian and European citizens have regarding expression compared to Americans even though EFFECTIVELY certain types of speech are restricted (e.g. holocaust denial)
That is because the list of restricted speech is incredibly miniscule, and there are strong protections in place otherwise that prevent a "slippery slope" situation from occurring. ("First you ban me from freely speaking about the holocaust not happening, next you ban me from criticizing the president!")
Practically, non-US democracies have demonstrated a stronger commitment freedom of assembly and freedom of the press than the US has over the last 4 years.
The only difference is that in the US these protections are guaranteed by an effectively "sacred document" that supercedes all laws (The constitution)
But it is more and more clear that that is a bug not a feature of the system, and is causing legitimate harm as your supreme court is getting stacked with "textualist originalists" who think that the wisdom of slave-owning cotton farmers applies unquestionably to 21st century technology and societal concerns.
And this is before we even get into the question of what it means for something to be "democratic", which is to say there is a "Democratic electoral process", which we're about to find out just how much the US process has been degraded as seemingly HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of people's votes will either be not counted, or will be denied the opportunity to vote. What is happening in the US would be impossible in any other Western Democracy.