2023-07-28 22:41:30
newspaper saidWall Street JournalIt said it had seen internal Facebook communications that showed the company responded to pressure from US President Joe Biden’s administration over coronavirus-related content.
The newspaper stated that among the content were publications claiming that the virus was man-made.
For its part, the White House confirmed, Thursday, that its steps were aimed at promoting the adoption of vaccines and other public health goals.
“We have consistently made it clear that we believe social media companies have a critical responsibility to consider the impacts of their platforms on the American people as they make independent decisions about the content of their platforms,” White House spokeswoman Karen Jean-Pierre said Thursday.
According to the newspaper, the emails show discussions by Facebook executives about managing user posts of content about the origin of the virus.
In an email in July 2021, Nick Clegg, the company’s head of international affairs, acknowledged to his colleagues the removal of content claiming man-made Covid.
“We’ve been under pressure from management and others to do more,” said Facebook’s vice president of content policy, adding, “We shouldn’t have done that.”
The discussions took place three months after the ban on posts asserting that COVID-19 was man-made was eased, in light of growing controversy over the origin of the virus.
Facebook’s internal email discussions were obtained by a Republican-led House Judiciary Committee, which has been investigating what Republican lawmakers say the Biden administration’s illegal efforts to censor Americans’ social media discourse about Covid and other topics.
Facebook has always emphasized that content moderation decisions are independent and not made in connection with politics. A spokesperson for the company declined to comment for the Wall Street Journal article.
The emails seen by the newspaper date back to the spring and summer of 2021, when the White House was waging a nationwide campaign to ensure that Americans get the vaccine.
The campaign was public and private to get Facebook to monitor vaccine-related content more aggressively.
And Biden administration officials believed that many Americans were hesitant about vaccination because of the misinformation they had seen on Facebook.
As an example, the CEO cited the White House’s desire for the company to take action against humorous or satirical content that suggests vaccines are not safe.
In some emails, Facebook executives expressed concern that removing posts in which Americans expressed reluctance to get vaccinated might actually make them reluctant to get vaccinated.
The newspaper quotes a draft memorandum sent to Facebook leadership, included in an email, in April 2021, that suppressing Americans’ speech and feeling marginalized by large institutions may push them more towards hesitation about a vaccine.
The draft memo said removing such posts could also feed conspiracy theories about a cover-up related to vaccine safety.
Meanwhile, Facebook officials seemed to feel pressure to address the White House’s concerns.
At the time, Facebook hoped to facilitate an agreement between US and European officials that would allow user data to flow across the Atlantic in compliance with privacy laws.
By August of 2021, executives began electronically sharing new changes imposed, including increased penalties for users who violate the content policy.
The company had previously removed an Instagram account belonging to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vaccine skeptic, who is now a presidential candidate. But his Facebook account did not face the same penalty, because it did not post the same content, as the emails show, according to the newspaper.
Democrats believe that the Republican-led investigation itself aims to bully platforms such as Facebook to ease content moderation policies, according to the newspaper.
They also say that the White House under former President Donald Trump engaged in similar harassment of social media companies as the Biden administration.
“In 2021, in the darkest days of the pandemic, the Biden administration has been working every angle possible to keep people alive,” a spokesperson for Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee said in a statement.
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