Red Right Daily

Truth in Freedom

Biden Adm Put This Pressure on Facebook – Watch

Biden Adm Put This Pressure on Facebook – Watch

The Biden administration has been accused of pressuring Facebook to suppress content from the conservative website The Daily Wire. They also tried to boost the reach of legacy media outlets, according to meeting notes recently turned over to Congress.

The newly released documents show that Facebook repeatedly confirmed to the White House that it was working to re-engineer its platform in order to accomplish the administration’s directives on suppressing content that clashed with its Covid vaccine agenda.

The reports turned over to Congress detail discussions then-White House Digital Director Rob Flaherty had with Facebook executives in 2021 where the Biden staffer pressured the Big Tech company to moderate content related to COVID vaccines in order to enforce the administration’s policy goals.

Flaherty asked Facebook about “chang[ing] the algorithm” to push content from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal over news from The Daily Wire and other “polarizing” entities.

“If you were to change the algorithm so that people were more likely to see NYT, WSJ, any authoritative news source over Daily Wire, Tomi Lahren, polarizing people. You wouldn’t have a mechanism to check the material impact?” Flaherty asked Facebook employees in a conversation about changing Americans’ attitudes about COVID vaccines, according to typed notes from the meeting.

In April 2021 and in the months following, The Daily Wire was the leading publisher on Facebook, getting far more clicks and reactions than the NYT, WSJ, and every other conservative and liberal news site.

“We have to explain to President, Ron, people, why there is misinfo on the internet, bigger problem than FB,” Flaherty was quoted as saying. “Where issues are, what interventions are, how well they are working, for products, want to engage in things that you know to be effective. I don’t even care about specific methodology, you have better, richer data than we’ll ever have.”

“What are the things driving hesitancy on your platform? What is it? How big is the problem? When you are intervening, how are you measuring success?” Flaherty asked, according to the meeting notes.

Flaherty became frustrated that Facebook could not provide some of the data the White House wanted and pushed the company to “play ball.”

“I feel like we’re running around in circles. Some partners give us lots of information, some partners tell us to f*** right off. This feels like we’re chasing our tails. If you don’t want to give information, just say that,” Flaherty is quoted as saying. “I don’t want to feel like I’m going to a dog and pony show. My dream for FB to play ball. It’s about will we get out of this f***ing mess.”

 

Written by Mark Stevens - August 3, 2023