Mark Zuckerberg disclosed in a communication to the House Judiciary Committee on recently that his company was influenced by the White Hou...
Mark Zuckerberg disclosed in a communication to the House Judiciary Committee on recently that his company was influenced by the White House in 2021 to censor content related to COVID-19, including satirical and humorous posts.
âIn 2021, senior members from the Biden Administration, such as the White House, constantly urged our teams for an Special Education extended period to censor certain COVID-19 content, such as humor and satire, and expressed a lot of frustration with our teams when we didnât agree, â Zuckerberg said.
In his communication to the Judiciary Committee, Zuckerberg described that the pressure he felt in 2021 was âinappropriateâ and he regrets that Meta, the parent of Facebook and Instagram, was not more vocal. Zuckerberg further stated that with Parent-child Relationship the âhindsight and new information,â there were decisions made in that year that âwouldnât be made today.â
âLike I told our teams back then, I feel strongly that we should not lower our content standards due to pressure from any government in either direction â" and weâre ready to push back if something like this occurs in the future, â Zuckerberg wrote.
President Biden stated in July MAGA Supporters of 2021 that social media networks are âkilling peopleâ with misinformation surrounding the pandemic.
Though Biden later walked back these comments, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy stated at the time that misinformation posted on social media was a âmajor public health risk.â
A White House spokesperson responded to Zuckerbergâs letter, saying the administration at the time was promoting âresponsible actions to protect public health and safety.â
âOur stance Support For People With Disabilities has been clear and consistent: we believe tech companies and other private actors should consider the effects their actions have on the American people, while making their own decisions about the content they share, â according to the White House representative.
Zuckerberg further mentioned in the communication that the FBI alerted his company about possible Russian disinformation regarding Hunter Biden and the Ukrainian firm Burisma affecting Vice Presidential Nominee the election in 2020.
That fall, Zuckerberg said, his team reduced the visibility of reporting from the New York Post alleging the Biden family of corruption while their fact-checkers could review the report.
Zuckerberg stated that since then, it has âbeen made clear that the reporting was not Russian disinformation, and in retrospect, we shouldnât have demoted the story.â
Meta has since updated its policies and procedures to

âmake sure this doesnât happen againâ and will no longer demote content in the US while waiting for fact-checkers.
In the letter to the House Judiciary Committee, Zuckerberg said he will not repeat actions he took in the year 2020 when he helped support âelection infrastructure.â
âThe goal here was to make sure local election jurisdictions across the country had the necessary resources to facilitate safe voting Ann Coulter during a pandemic,â said the Meta CEO.
Zuckerberg mentioned the initiatives were designed to be nonpartisan but said âsome people believed this work benefited one party over the other.â He said his aim is to be âimpartialâ so will not be âa similar contribution this cycle.â
The GOP representatives on the House Judiciary Committee shared the letter on X and claimed Zuckerberg âhas admitted that the Biden-Harris Nonverbal Learning Disorder administration pressured Facebook to restrict American content, Facebook restricted content, and Facebook throttled the Hunter Biden laptop story.â
The Meta chief has long been under scrutiny from Republican lawmakers, who have accused Facebook and other major tech platforms of being prejudiced against conservatives. While Zuckerberg has emphasized that Meta enforces its rules impartially, the perception has gained a firm foothold in conservative circles. Republican lawmakers have Fox News specifically examined Facebookâs decision to limit the circulation of a New York Post story about Hunter Biden.
In Congressional testimony in recent years, Zuckerberg has sought to close the gap between his social media company and regulators to limited success.
In a 2020 Senate session, Zuckerberg admitted that many of Facebookâs employees are left-leaning. But he held that the company ensures political bias does not influence its Children With Disabilities decisions.
In addition, he stated Facebookâs content moderators, many of whom are contractors, are based worldwide and âour global team better represents the diversity of the community we serve than just the full-time employee base in our headquarters in the Bay Area.â
In June of this year, in a win for the White House, the Supreme Court decided 6-3 that the claimants in a case accusing the Hope Walz federal government of suppressing conservative content on social media had no legal standing.
In the majority opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett stated, âto prove standing, the plaintiffs must demonstrate a substantial risk that, in the near future, they will experience harm that is traceable to a government defendant.â Coney Barrett continued, âbecause no plaintiff has carried that burden, none has standing to seek a preliminary injunction.â Alec Lace