As the 2020 presidential election approaches, Facebook is emerging as a key target of Democrats who say the social media giant’s passive approach to President Donald Trump’s provocative online statements is endangering American lives and the state of American democracy.
In the two weeks since Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg declined to take action on a post by Trump that appeared to endorse the shooting of protesters against police brutality who engaged in looting, Democrats in Congress and former Vice President Joe Biden, the party’s presumptive nominee to run against Trump, have turned on Facebook’s content policies.
In a letter to Zuckerberg last week, Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II, D-Mo., and other House Democrats wrote that the company’s response to violent content and the spread of disinformation on its platform, such as Trump’s recent false statements about mail-in voting, “are extremely troubling.” Continue reading.