United States presidential administration Joe Biden engaged in regular censorship of social networks in consultation with the leadership of online platforms, follows from the correspondence and a joint statement by Attorneys General of Louisiana and Missouri Jeff Landry and Eric Schmitt.
“The communications presented show an extensive ‘censorship enterprise’ between multiple federal agencies. 45 federal officials have been identified who have communicated with social media platforms about ‘incorrect information’ and censorship,” the statement said.
According to the document, with the leadership of the largest online platforms, including Meta* and Twitterthe White House, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Census Bureau, as well as the Electoral Commission, the Treasury Department and other US government agencies interacted regularly.
At the same time, prosecutors note that the Ministry of Justice refused to provide the full amount of information on the interaction of high-ranking federal officials with social networks, limiting itself to individual communications.
“Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry and Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt have filed a joint petition in federal court demanding that the Justice Department turn over communications between senior Biden administration officials from the White House, State Department, FBI, and other entities with major social media,” the statement said. document.
“The Justice Department has already turned over communications between a number of federal officials and social media, but has declined to provide data on top-level government officials’ interactions with social media,” prosecutors said in a joint statement.
According to one of the published materials of the correspondence dated July 2021, the representative Facebook* directly points to meeting with White House officials to discuss issues of combating “incorrect information”: “Our teams met today to better understand the list of what the White House expects from us regarding misinformation.”
Other published messages include communications regarding the spread of information about the coronavirus.
American social networks have been repeatedly criticized for censoring and restricting the freedom to disseminate information in the interests of the US authorities. One of the latest examples of such a policy was the recognition of the head of Meta* Mark Zuckerbergwho announced the FBI’s requests ahead of the 2020 presidential election to curb the spread of content stories on platforms he controls. Hunter Biden’s laptopthe son of the current head of the White House, Joe Biden, which could indicate the involvement of Biden Jr. in criminal activities in the field of drug trafficking and prostitution.
BBC Russian Service, 08/26/2022, “Zuckerberg: Biden’s laptop story censored due to FBI warning”: In an interview with popular podcaster Joe Rogan, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the social network restricted access to an article about Joe Biden’s son during the 2020 election due to FBI warnings about possible misinformation. […] Facebook and Twitter initially restricted the article’s distribution, but due to censorship allegations that followed, the restrictions were lifted.
“When we delete what we shouldn’t, that’s the worst thing,” Zuckerberg said in a rare media interview on Joe Rogan’s popular podcast. […] Zuckerberg told Rogan: “The backstory here is that the FBI came to us – some of the people on our team – and said, ‘Hey, just so you know, you have to be on high alert. We think there was a lot of Russian propaganda in the 2016 elections, and we believe there will be some kind of similar leak.”
According to him, the FBI did not specifically warn Facebook about the Biden story, Facebook itself considered that this story “fits this template.” […] Asked by Zuckerberg if he regrets hiding the real story, the Facebook founder replied: “It sucks… I think it sucks as much as going through a criminal trial but in the end being found not guilty… but in the end you are free.” “. […]
Facebook didn’t stop the entire article from being shared, but it did restrict the algorithm that automatically shared it with other people for a week while independent experts tried to verify the claims it contained. Thus, while the article could be published and discussed, it was less likely to naturally spread to other users. In turn, Twitter generally banned the publication of the article. — Inset K.ru
Izvestia.ru, 09/02/2022, “The Biden administration regularly censored social networks”: In May, Attorneys General Eric Schmitt and Jeff Landry filed a lawsuit against Joe Biden administration officials for colluding with Meta, Twitter and YouTube to increase censorship and violate free speech. They accused Biden administration officials of “coercion, threats and pressure on social media platforms to censor objectionable speakers and viewpoints using threats of adverse government action.” In the same month, it became known that, according to an audit by software company SparkToro, 49.3% of U.S. President Joe Biden’s followers on Twitter turned out to be fake. — Inset K.ru
* The activity of Meta (social networks Facebook and Instagram) is banned in Russia as extremist.