Biden slams Facebook for letting Trump spread false claims, issues call for accountability
As Facebook continues to shrink from responsibilities that would see the company moderating political speech, Joe Biden has apparently had enough.
The presumptive Democratic nominee launched a campaign of sorts against Facebook leadership Thursday, with an open letter slamming Facebook’s decisions and a catchy hashtag, #movefastfixit—a play on the company’s much-maligned early slogan, “Move fast and break things.”
In the broadside against the social network, Biden calls on his supporters—and perhaps more broadly, Facebook’s critics—to demand the platform stop promoting “fake news” (a favorite term of President Trump, applied differently here), move quickly to remove viral misinformation, act against content that could suppress the vote and to stop PACs and candidates from relying on Facebook ads to “spread lies,” particularly within two weeks of the election.
As part of its attack on the social network’s perceived failures, Biden is asking supporters to sign a petition joining his demands and even provides a direct link for anyone interested in sending a form letter to Facebook over Twitter DM.
“With fewer than five months until the 2020 election, real changes to Facebook’s policies for their platform and how they enforce them are necessary to protect against a repeat of the role that disinformation played in the 2016 election and that continues to threaten our democracy today,” Biden campaign spokesperson Bill Russo said in a statement to TechCrunch. “We are urging our supporters to make their voices heard in this call for change.”
As Facebook continues to shrink from responsibilities that would see the company moderating political speech, Joe Biden has apparently had enough. The presumptive Democratic nominee launched a campaign of sorts against Facebook leadership Thursday, with an open letter slamming Facebook’s decisions and a catchy hashtag, #movefastfixit—a play on the company’s much-maligned…
