Does Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg Have a Secret Deal With Trump?
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In October 2019, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg attended an undisclosed dinner with Donald Trump at the White House. The news broke in November. It is still unclear why these two men met and what was discussed.
Zuckerberg has been reluctant to denounce Trump. In fact, Facebook has done nothing to censor Trump despite his track record of running a disinformation campaign. While Trump spread obvious lies about Hillary Clinton in 2016 across their platform, Facebook did nothing.
Facebook is turning a blind eye again in 2020
Recently, the Trump campaign ran an ad on Facebook using a 2014 Ukraine protest to prove “chaos and violence” in America. After it was proven to be a lie, Facebook refused to remove Trump’s ad.
Facebook claims it doesn’t believe in censorship
If Facebook doesn’t believe in censorship, then why has Facebook has been busy silencing liberal voices on its platform. This weekend, Facebook removed MeidasTouch from its platform after they posted a negative comment about Trump.
Zuckerberg denies having a deal with Trump. However, even if there is no secret deal, it doesn’t mean that Zuckerberg doesn’t benefit from an alliance with Trump. Zuckerberg is anxious to avoid antitrust investigations, while Trump is anxious to win in November.
Next Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing with Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai to focus on antitrust issues.
Is there a quid pro quo?
Zuckerburg has allowed Trump to lie to Americans without any fear of censorship since 2016.
Facebook has refused to remove misleading news and supposedly adopted a policy that allows conservative publishers to mislead to its’ users. Moreover, The Washington Post reported that Facebook “altered its news feed algorithm to neutralize claims that it was biased against conservative publishers, according to more than a dozen former and current employees and previously unreported documents obtained by The Washington Post.”
Fun Fact: In May 2019, Zuckerberg refused to remove a doctored video of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that made her appear drunk. Zuckerberg cited free speech.
In May, Zuckerberg appeared on Fox News and stated, “I just believe strongly that Facebook shouldn't be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online. In general, private companies probably shouldn't be – especially these platform companies – shouldn't be in the position of doing that.”
If this is really Zuckerberg’s position, then why is he only censoring liberal voices?
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