Republican Jim Jordan, Member of the United States House of Representatives, shared a thread called “Facebook Files” on Twitter. The sharing revealed that Meta employees were under pressure from the White House.
Jordan included previously unseen documents in his post a few hours ago. Documents obtained by the House of Representatives contain internal conversations from employees of Facebook and Instagram’s parent company Meta.
Meta censored COVID-19 vaccine contents under Biden-led White House pressure, according to documents
Never-before-released internal documents subpoenaed by the Judiciary Committee PROVE that Facebook and Instagram censored posts and changed their content moderation policies because of unconstitutional pressure from the Biden White House.
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) July 27, 2023
Sharing a long thread, Jordan states that Facebook and Instagram, which is managed by Meta, are blocking posts about COVID-19 vaccines and even changing their policies. It is said that this was done under the pressure of the White House.
“Previously unpublished internal documents prove that Facebook and Instagram censored posts and changed their content moderation policies due to unconstitutional pressure from the Biden White House,” Jordan says.
An email sent by an employee to CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg in April 2021 contains statements that they want content removed under White House pressure.
In April 2021, a Facebook employee circulated an email for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg, writing: “We are facing continued pressure from external stakeholders, including the [Biden] White House” to remove posts. pic.twitter.com/iDRV3Kk2oO
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) July 27, 2023
“We face constant pressure to remove posts from outside stakeholders, including the White House and the press. For example, we recently shared a post on Facebook with the White House about the 100 most popular vaccines in the US. Although information from the authorities dominated the list, the White House was concerned about an anti-vaccination joke post and asked us to delete it.
Yet another e-mail from 2021 states that Joe Biden’s advisor was furious that a post was not removed.
In another April 2021 email, Nick Clegg, Facebook’s president for global affairs, informed his team at Facebook that Andy Slavitt, a Senior Advisor to President Biden, was “outraged . . . that [Facebook] did not remove” a particular post. pic.twitter.com/5muflAQjcx
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) July 27, 2023
Andy Slavitt, Biden’s advisor on the COVID-19 side, was furious that Meta didn’t remove a post, according to an email to employees from Meta’s global affairs manager, Nick Clegg. It was stated that this post was intended to deter from getting a COVID vaccine.
According to the document Jordan shared, Clegg later stated that removing such content is against freedom of expression in the USA. Slavitt stated that this is not true. Slavitt stated that the vaccine was linked to asbestos poisoning in the content, which damaged the confidence that the Biden administration was trying to provide about COVID vaccines.
According to the documents, Facebook changed its policies after what happened
August 2, 2021:
“[Facebook’s] Leadership asked Misinfo Policy . . . to brainstorm some additional policy levers we can pull to be more aggressive against . . . misinformation. This is stemming from the continued criticism of our approach from the [Biden] administration.” pic.twitter.com/bfNSeujQI7
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) July 27, 2023
Jordan says Facebook panicked afterwards. In the documents, it is stated that another company executive, Brian Rice, stated that they were very at odds with the White House after what happened with Slavitt.
Finally, after Joe Biden’s statement that “Social media kills people due to disinformation”, it was claimed that in August 2021, Meta management made decisions to be more aggressive against disinformation. It was also among the rumors that the policies were changed after the pressure from the government.
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