Zuckerberg pledges to maintain neutrality in this election and raises concerns about Biden’s pressure on Meta to censor Covid content.
For Republicans, Mark Zuckerberg is the villain, often blamed for “stealing” the 2020 election from Donald Trump. But the Meta CEO has been striving in recent months to prove that he is a politically neutral player in the world of social media. His most recent display of loyalty to the Republican party could be the most transparent yet, even when Trump said in July that he wanted.
Zuckerberg sent a letter to Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, which has gone viral on the social network formerly known as Twitter. In the letter, Zuck says that the government has tried to “censor” expression. “In 2021… the White House pressured our teams for months to censor COVID-19 content, including humor and satire, and expressed great frustration when we disagreed.” In reality, the Facebook co-founder acknowledges that “censorship” would not be the correct term because it was his company’s decision whether to do it or not.
Mark Zuckerberg just admitted three things:
1. Biden-Harris Admin “pressured” Facebook to censor Americans.
2. Facebook censored Americans.
3. Facebook throttled the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Big win for free speech.
The White House responded in a statement on Tuesday, saying they believed that tech companies have to act responsibly when it comes to protecting the public.
Repeat ten times: I am neutral
Also mentioned was the story of Hunter Biden’s laptop, and Zuckerberg felt that the FBI was not telling the truth when they claimed it was Russian disinformation to influence the 2020 election. While that was indeed the intention, nothing was published to suggest that everything was false.
It should be noted that Rudy Giuliani, who supports Trump, refused to show the laptop to anyone other than the New York Post.
Most Americans would think it reasonable if the FBI flagged content on a social network, technically legal, in cases of extremism or hidden plans believed to be close to execution by geopolitical enemies of the U.S. in the New Cold War.
The last thing mentioned in his letter to Jordan was the money he donated to non-partisan political groups before the 2020 election, as they worked to expand voting rights access during the COVID pandemic, such as installing mail drop boxes. Everything was very normal, but Trump’s followers said it was foul play.
Zuck asserts that he tries to be neutral. He doesn’t want to boost one side or the other, so this time he won’t be making any contributions.
Truth Social, the social network founded by Trump, warned users about Zuckerberg on Tuesday.
The Meta CEO truly wants to be seen as neutral, someone who can be a friend to Trump’s crew. Only time will tell if this strategy bears any fruit.
