Biden Admin Demanded Facebook Suppress Daily Wire, Tomi Lahren to Control COVID Narrative
“If you were to change the algorithm so that people were more likely to see NYT, WSJ, any authoritative news source over Daily Wire, Tomi Lahren, polarizing people. You wouldn’t have a mechanism to check the material impact?”
The latest Facebook Files from Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan reveals that the Biden administration pressured Facebook to suppress Daily Wire and Tomi Lahren content to control the COVID narrative.
It started small. After all, you cannot just go all in. You have to carve a path and break them down to the point where they think everything you demand is totally cool and acceptable.
First step: Rob Flaherty, President Biden’s then-Director of Digital Strategy, asked Facebook to explain why it allowed certain content. Why would Facebook allow The New York Post to share so many articles? How dare they.
“NY Post churning out articles every day about people dying. What is supposed to happen to that from Policy perspective. Dies that article get a reduction, labels?”
So it doesn’t matter if the article is true.
For example, Flaherty questioned whether Facebook was doing enough to reduce traffic from sites like the @nypost.
“I’m curious – NY Post churning out articles every day… What is supposed to happen to that from Policy perspective. Does that article get a reduction, labels?” pic.twitter.com/zC8QFWcckZ
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
Second step: Flaherty suggested Facebook kick people off the platform because that’s what he would do. How could Facebook possibly not agree with him?
“My question on inform – intellectually my bias is to kick people off. Inform, intellectually, maybe path of most impact.”
Third step: Flaherty piled on the flattery! “My dream for FB [is] to play ball.”
The Biden White House’s effort to censor opposing viewpoints only grew.
So, they upped the pressure.
Flaherty demanded that Facebook “play ball” and work with the Biden White House on censorship.
He called it his “dream.” pic.twitter.com/J0Z2AhDx8m
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
Fourth step: Demand without making a demand. As he did above, Flaherty disguises the demand as a “suggestion.” He wanted Facebook to change the algorithm to show fewer posts from The Daily Wire and Tomi Lahren. How dare they show up with the NYT and WSJ.
“If you were to change the algorithm so that people were more likely to see NYT, WSJ, any authoritative news source over Daily Wire, Tomi Lahren, polarizing people. You wouldn’t have a mechanism to check the material impact?”
But that’s not all.
The Biden White House wanted to control what you saw on Facebook.
They questioned whether Facebook could change its algorithm so users saw more posts from the New York Times and less from the @realDailyWire and @TomiLahren. pic.twitter.com/oZUDDv6324
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
Fifth step: Remind Facebook that rural towns have only stupid residents. Thanks a lot, Courtney Rowe. She worked as Biden’s head of strategic communications and public engagement for the #COVID19 response.
“Love that broken down by region and demographics. But equally important, how do we work with you all to push back on it. If someone in rural Arkansas sees something on FB, it’s the truth.”
Why did they do that? Because they didn’t think you were smart enough to decide for yourself.
President Biden’s head of strategic communications and public engagement for the #COVID19 response, Courtney Rowe, mocked Real America’s ability to determine what’s true and what isn’t. pic.twitter.com/NS3PJBM7M5
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
Sixth step: More pressure. Facebook isn’t doing enough.
“That’s why from product perspective, it’s so important to look at mechanisms – if we can’t remove it, at least we need to contain it.”
We have to contain it! Yes, Flaherty, we must listen to Our Betters and stop bad information. You know better.
“We’re keen on what platforms are doing to reduce the spread of bad information, that platforms are not funneling people towards bad content. That’s our primary concern.”
But Flaherty continued to press for more content moderation and CONTROL on so-called “bad” content.
Read ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/OpmcIktt0K
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
Facebook caved because, of course, they did. It only wanted to promote positive content.
It didn’t matter if the “negative” post about COVID vaccines contained the truth. It didn’t have a positive attitude about the vaccines, so it must go away.
“And we attack virality aspect through feed demotions. We remove content that can lead to imminent physical harm. For content that doesn’t meet that threshold, we instituted borderline demotions. For example, someone sharing negative side effect posts. Similarly, posts questioning whether you should get a vaccine under a mandate, whether it’s government overreach. We demote those. That’s not false information, but it leads to a vaccine negative environment. When it comes to looking at COVID misinformation, it’s a different approach. What we normally do is just remove or leave to fact checkers. Here, we introduced a middle ground.”
Just read this from a Facebook employee. pic.twitter.com/IXMKmzAEvE
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) August 3, 2023
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Comments
Nothing will happen to him.
Unless a private citizen does it.
Their side wants to do away with free speech and yet we are the authoritarians.
Political projection is the mainstay of the Democrat Socialist party.
They’re not doing much more than Google in downplaying or omitting “bad” (i.e. unapproved) content.
Would that the vaccine had suppressed the virus one tenth as much as the suppression of truthful information concerning it.
No way the Fed govt or its agents would ever knowingly conspire to deprive the public of their constitutional rights. /s
Yes this was a violation. FB wasn’t acting independently of govt nor was FB following its terms of service so the ‘private company can do what it wants’ argument doesn’t wash. When the folks with power to impose or withdraw the regulatory power of the Federal govt make a ‘suggestion’ it isn’t the same as coming from an anonymous person in ‘comment box’. Hopefully the parties directly impacted will pursue legal remedies.
do you really think “legal remedies” will contain/alleviate the problem?
did voting for The Donald see him elected as POTUS?
the system is broken; I don’t know how it can be fixed, do you?
Suing FB into oblivion would be a start. So would using regulatory power to break them up just like AT&T.
Crying into your beer, with a woe is me/we are doomed/we can’t win attitude and choosing to be depressed instead of deciding to redouble your efforts and working to make change sure as heck will not fix anything.
You eat an apple one bite at a time and that’s how we begin to to fix things, one step at a time. We didn’t get into our current circumstances all at once and we won’t get out of it all at once either.
The factual record is growing by the day, as to the utterly brazen, lawless and obnoxiously totalitarian behavior of crime boss Biden and his vile Dumb-o-crat lackeys in censoring opinions, jokes and satire. Judge Doughty’s injunction barring the White House and federal agencies from communicating with social media companies should have been left in place, but, there is no way that the factual record could ever support the Executive Branch winning this appeal to the full circuit court. The list of coercive acts to suppress speech is far too long.
In all of history, has there ever been a time where truth could not stand on its own but needed to be propped up by lies, suppression, and manipulation?
The Biden regime/ Deep State seems to think so.
You’re too stupid, peasant. Sit down, shut up, and listen to us, your betters.
Also please notice that no First Amendment issue is raised because congress made no law scrubbing social media posts — this was a threat from the executive branch. The Framers figured that the Congress would slip and violate free speech rights, which is why the judiciary and executive veto were inserted into the constitution.
But when the president willfully ignores the document and threatens private citizens with the state’s monopoly on lethal force… well, that’s why we are where we are today.
In actual fact, the fount of misinformation was the government itself. It was wrong about the origin of the virus (it was lab leak, not the wet market and not an animal in the wild), it was wrong about having to wear masks, it was wrong about isolation and forcibly closing most businesses and institutions, it was wrong about restricting travel, it was wrong about closing schools and it was wrong about forcing everyone, even school age children to get Wu-flu shots. As for the shots themselves, the government was wrong in calling the shots vaccines. They are in no way vaccines because they don’t have viruses, dead or weakened, in them that would generate an antibody immune response. They are not even reliable or long lasting. I have read that at best, they yield two months of partial immunity. Moreover, for individuals under 65, the costs from potential devastating side effects may outweigh any benefits.
So, at the end of day, who was right? The censored or the censor?
In a free society, we must allow even crackpots, and even people who appear to be saying hateful things, to have their say. Only by allowing uncensored speech in the market poace of ideas is there a chance of arriving at the truth. The Brandon Administration should br forefully condemned for its gaving censored opposing opinions.
The government doesn’t see this. They continue to create programs, enact policies, and hire czars to “combat disinformation.” They assume, with zero proof (and shitloads of counterexamples), that what they believe is true is a priori objectively true. They never pay attention to critics who kindly point out, “let’s assume, for a moment, that THIS is your ass, and THIS is your elbow, see how it changes things?”
Agreed.
Under the Constitution the government can’t have NGOs do its bidding when it’s been forbidden for doing the same.
Tyranny by proxy.
This conduct by Biden’s people was clearly violative of the First Amendment and should be challenged as such.
Why are people still obsessing about Facebook. We all know they will suppress any and all information that the Biden regime deems to be unacceptable. We need to be worrying more about the upcoming 2024 presidential election and how we’re actually going to win that (despite Trump) than about old news like this. republicans need to get back into the White House. After that, they can deal with Zuckerberg and the rest as they see fit.
Impeachable