White House responds to Zuckerberg’s letter

WASHINGTON D.C. — The White House responded today to Mark Zuckerberg’s letter alleging that Facebook was pressured into censoring posts about COVID-19 and Hunter Biden’s laptop story.

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Zuckerberg’s letter

On Monday, August 26th, Mark Zuckerberg sent a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, a standing committee in the House of Representatives responsible for overseeing the administration of justice in various federal capacities.

In his letter, Zuckerberg stated that he was pressured by the Biden Administration to censor content related to COVID-19. He stated that the administration “expressed a lot of frustration with our teams when we didn’t agree.” 

Zuckerberg said that he ultimately decided to go along with the demands coming from the White House, but ultimately regrets doing so.

“I believe the government pressure was wrong,” Zuckerberg said. “And I regret that we were not more outspoken about it. I also think we made some choices that, with the benefit of hindsight and new information, we wouldn’t make today.”

He affirmed that he would not alter his content standards due to political pressure going forward, no matter which administration wanted it.

Zuckerberg then explained that Facebook had repressed posts about “corruption allegations involving then-Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s family” due to a communication sent to them by the FBI prior to the initial Washington Post article. According to Zuckerberg, the FBI had told them that it was a Russian disinformation operation, which was later found to not be the case.

Before closing the letter, Zuckerberg stated that he had changed policies to prevent that issue from happening again. He said that he would step back from involvement in electoral infrastructure going forward.

The White House responds

The White House responded by stating that they try to combat misinformation online for the benefit of public health.

“Our position has been clear and consistent,” the White House said. “We believe tech companies and other private actors should take into account the effects of their actions that they have on the American people while making independent choices about the information that they present.”

The response did not go into any further detail on the allegations in Zuckerberg’s letter. 

Others chime in

Many responded after the House Judiciary GOP posted Zuckerberg’s letter on X. Conservative lawmakers touted it as a major victory over censorship of right-leaning voices on social media.

However, a large number of questions remain unanswered. The letter mentioned suppressing humor and satire content related to COVID-19, as well as the Washington Post story on the Hunter Biden laptop, but gave no specifics beyond that.

“And that’s the black box of all this,” said ABC News correspondent Jay O’Brien. “It’s hard to figure out what posts were flagged by the White House that resulted in them being removed. And where they posts that were beyond the pale and clear misinformation or was it a kind of grey area? We certainly don’t know.”