Mark Zuckerberg has admitted that the Biden administration was ‘wrong’ to demand Facebook censor what they deemed ‘COVID misinformation’ during the pandemic.
The Meta CEO said in a letter to the House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan that they’ll fight back against any attempts at censorship in the future and also admitted the company had ‘demoted’ stories about Hunter Biden’s laptop.
He wrote that the White House ‘repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humour and satire, and expressed a lot of frustration with our teams when we didn’t agree’.
He said this pressure ‘was wrong’ and regrets ‘that we were not more outspoken about it’.
‘We made some choices that, with the benefit of hindsight and new information, we wouldn’t make today,’ he added.
‘I feel strongly that we should not compromise our content standards due to pressure from any administration in either direction – and we’re ready to push back if something like this happens again.’
A spokesperson for the White House told DailyMail in a statement that the Biden administration’s policy is to encourage big tech to act responsibly.
‘When confronted with a deadly pandemic, this Administration encouraged responsible actions to protect public health and safety. Our position has been clear and consistent: we believe tech companies and other private actors should consider their actions’ effects on the American people while making independent choices about the information they present.’
A spokesperson for Meta told the Wall Street Journal the letter spoke for itself.
Zuckerberg also said that Meta would not repeat what it did in 2020, funding non-profits to fund local election efforts, which Republicans criticized as ‘Zuckerbucks’ meant to assist liberals.
He and his wife Priscilla Chan gave nearly $420million to nonprofits that aided in the administration and infrastructure of the 2020 election, and heavily favored Democrat counties.
Zuckerberg, 37, and Chan, 36, donated $ 419.5 million to The Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) and The Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR), which the report says was given with specific conditions.