Flashback: Vice President Kamala Harris' current campaign adviser was deeply involved in pressuring Facebook to curb “misinformation” in order to control political discourse around the coronavirus and other issues.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg Acknowledged in letter President Trump on Monday expressed dismay over the Biden-Harris administration's pressure on his company, Facebook, to censor content, particularly related to the coronavirus, and highlighted actions taken by Harris' deputy campaign manager Rob Flaherty as part of that pressure campaign.
Flaherty previously served as the White House director of digital strategy and led a campaign to target alleged “misinformation” about the COVID-19 virus and its vaccines, Fox Business reported. Reported previously.
In April 2021, Flaherty told members of the Google team: […] “They will be required to outline efforts to combat vaccine hesitancy as well as crack down on vaccine misinformation,” the document said.
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Vice President Harris' aides have previously helped pressure tech companies to curb certain speech on social media. (Getty Images)
Flaherty continued to ask about trends in vaccine misinformation on the website and offered government assistance in the form of a White House COVID expert and a product development partnership with YouTube.
In an internal email, Google said that after a subsequent meeting with Flaherty, White House staff “particularly pressed us about decision-making regarding borderline content,” which YouTube says is content that comes close to but doesn't violate its community guidelines.
One week later, Google acknowledged The administration has discussed wanting more data and has sent the White House the total number of videos that have been removed for misinformation about COVID vaccines.
“Really [Flaherty’s] “We're curious to see what videos haven't been removed,” one internal email between Google employees said, seemingly referring to videos that have not yet been removed.
According to internal communications viewed by FOX Business, Report in 2023Flaherty asked Facebook whether it could give government agencies special access to tools to target users in 2021.
“In the context of a global pandemic, is it possible to give ad agencies access to targeting parameters that they normally don't have access to?” Flaherty asked.
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Robert Flaherty will testify before the House Judiciary Committee on May 1. (House of Representatives Judiciary Committee)
The idea came during a conversation about how to convince people worried about side effects of the COVID vaccine to get vaccinated.
During an April 5 conference call, Facebook employees said that if someone was worried about getting a nosebleed as a side effect of the vaccine, they would ideally be directed to information that addressed that concern. “Can we provide resources to you?” Flaherty asked the Facebook team.
Another Facebook employee responded that actions such as offering targeted resources to address their concerns could incite people, saying “we need to be careful how we approach that.”
“If people are having the conversation, you have to allow that to happen. Direct them to the CDC. And what happens then?” Flaherty asked.
“We all know someone who has had the experience of feeling like Facebook is listening to their conversations,” a Facebook employee responded.
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Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg previously claimed that Facebook had suppressed 18 million posts containing “misinformation” about COVID-19. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Facebook employees told Flaherty that while instantly generating a message about a nosebleed might give users a “Big Brother vibe,” the company might delay the content to avoid raising alarm bells among users.
“We have to pay attention to those conversations and make sure people see the information, even if it's not appropriate at the time,” the Facebook employee said.
During a congressional hearing earlier this year, Flaherty engaged in a tense exchange with Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, during which he argued: Elon Musk The media said it “did not face any adverse action from the government” in response to the change in censorship policy.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House and the Harris-Waltz campaign for comment but did not receive a response.
“Ultimately, our decision whether to remove content is ours and we take responsibility for our decisions, including the COVID-19 related changes we made to our enforcement approach in response to this pressure,” Zuckerberg said in a letter to the House Judiciary Committee this week. “We believe the government pressure was misguided, and we regret that we did not speak out more.”
Fox News Digital's Hilary Vaughn and Chase Williams contributed to this report.
