Newly released documents show that President Biden, who routinely bemoans perceived threats to freedom and democracy, is not only pressuring social media companies to censor speech and suppress conservative news; It is also shown that they are pursuing literature that contains unfavorable views.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) revealed On Monday, Congressional investigators announced that documents subpoenaed show Amazon “bowed to President Biden’s pressure to censor books.”
Inside Amazon Email A message sent on March 9, 2021, about a meeting with the White House, states that the Biden administration was asking the company to “remove books, or place more emphasis on search results/order (or both).” It included the question, “Are you doing so?”
Jordan said the issue is a priority for Amazon because “President Biden’s official, Andy Slavitt, who called on Facebook to censor memes and real information, was simultaneously putting pressure on Amazon.” said.
Slavitt is a senior Biden adviser who helped steer COVID-19 policy, told Americans “we could have done a little bit better” during the pandemic and censored Tucker Carlson’s videos and memes about vaccine side effects pressured Facebook to do so.
Jordan said Slavitt and others with President Biden “performed keyword searches on controversial topics, such as ‘vaccines,’ and emailed Amazon if… said. [they] I didn’t like the way the search results were displayed. ”
In an email sent on March 2, 2021, Slavitt pressed Amazon on who the White House could “talk to about high-level propaganda, misinformation, and disinformation.” [sic] Amazon? ”
Slavitt wrote: another email“If you search for ‘vaccine’ under books, you’ll see what comes up. I haven’t looked further, but if it’s something that’s on the surface, that’s a concern.”
zack butterworthBiden’s former public sector official similarly chided Amazon employees and expressed concerns about books on the site. 1 instance The sales page did not have a warning label from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Amazon initially refused to manually censor books for fear of creating too much public heat.
The company’s Exchange Management Group said in a document dated March 2, 2021: Email“We will not be doing any manual intervention today. The team/PR felt very strongly that this would be too noticeable and further complicate the Harry and Sally story (which seems to be getting the Fox News treatment today).” Solve the long-term problem [sic] Because it is related to customer behavior. ”
“Removing the customer behavior association completely will break your search,” the email continued.
Rather than censor it completely, the company will, at least initially, “expand the Searchlight flag for redirects on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website to appear at the top of the page for more search keys.” decided to do so.
Despite these efforts, Amazon Group says it’s “not satisfactory. WH will probably ask if we don’t remove the content, why don’t we remove it like FB and Twitter do? It’s under consideration.” “It’s an option,” he admitted.by [sic] It’s something you don’t want to publish to avoid boxing in. ”
In response to a pressure campaign to censor President Biden’s wrong ideas, Amazon has coined the following boilerplate excuse:
- “Our guidelines address content that we prohibit, such as content that is illegal or infringing, creates a poor customer experience, or pornography. We do not specifically address content about
- “We believe that retailers are different from social media communities, which means we consider what content is available to us, where it is available in our stores, and how we respond to content that disappoints our customers. It means that you are doing it.”
- “As a retailer, we offer our customers access to a variety of perspectives, including books that some customers may find offensive. It is up to all bookstores to decide which bookstores to offer. Yes, and we do not take the decision to choose lightly.”
Amazon’s canned responses clearly failed to satisfy the ruling powers.
A week later, Amazon representatives met with members of President Joe Biden’s executive team who were “feeling pressure from the White House” to “take a close look at books related to vaccine misinformation and to Discuss additional steps Amazon may want to take to reduce visibility. ”
It appears the White House got what it wanted: increased censorship.
“Starting on March 9, the same day as the meeting with the White House, Amazon put into effect a ‘prohibition ban’ on books expressing the view that vaccines are ineffective,” Jordan said.
An internal Amazon email dated March 12, 2021 stated that the company had “reviewed all mentioned titles in CRM and worked with a team that specializes in search, reviews, and personalization tools.” .
“One book (out of nine) was found to violate our COVID-19 policies and has been removed,” the damning update continued. “As a reminder, on March 9, we put into effect a ban on the promotion of anti-vaccine books whose primary purpose is to convince readers that vaccines are unsafe or ineffective. We plan to explore additional handling options.”
“I’ve been thinking about it. The government is pressuring Amazon to ban books. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube — all this big combination is going to have an impact.” [an] Now that the election is over, we see that the same thing is happening, and the same dynamics are playing out at Amazon. ”
Commenting on new revelations about state-sponsored censorship efforts at Amazon, Aaron Keliaty said: director Director of the Bioethics and American Democracy Program at the Center for Ethics and Public Policy; tweeted“Further proof that the leviathan of federal censorship extends not only to social media but also to Amazon’s books.”
Foundation for Individual Rights in Education I got it.“If accurate, these new documents are another disturbing example of the government pressuring private actors to suppress unfavorable views.”
Alam Bokhari, a journalist who has exposed various censorship efforts in the digital space, I have written“People who call their critics ‘fascists’ and enjoy obnoxious catchphrases like ‘democracy dies in darkness’ spent the beginning of 2021 taking advantage of government pressure to ban books. Ta.”
Jay Bhattacharyya, professor of medicine at Stanford University and co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration, said: I have written“At this point, if the Supreme Court doesn’t stop this Biden administration censorship nonsense (probably Missouri v. Biden), the United States may as well apologize for its revolution, end the deal, and turn it back to the states.” The British Crown. ”
In August 2022, Bhattacharyya, along with Dr. Martin Kulldorff, Reopen Louisiana activist Jill Hines, and the states of Missouri and Louisiana, used the First Amendment to override the rights of critics and questioners of the coronavirus government. has joined legal efforts to hold the Biden administration accountable for its handling of the matter. 19 policies.
U.S. District Judge Terry A. Doughty wrote on July 4: ruling Their lawsuit argues that “if Plaintiffs’ allegations are true, this case involves perhaps the most extensive attack on free speech in U.S. history.”
Doughty issued a preliminary injunction against the Biden administration, ordering its agencies and officials to order social media companies to remove, remove, or suppress “content containing protected free speech posted on social media platforms.” , prohibiting requests for reductions.
However, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit revoked the injunction against all officials except the CDC, White House, Surgeon General, and FBI.
The U.S. Supreme Court has since stayed the Fifth Circuit’s order and is scheduled to hear the case in 2023-2024.
Do you like Blaze News? Avoid censorship and sign up for our newsletter to get articles like this delivered straight to your inbox. Please register here!
