{"id":1630081,"date":"2022-09-01T18:17:42","date_gmt":"2022-09-01T22:17:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1630081"},"modified":"2022-09-01T18:17:47","modified_gmt":"2022-09-01T22:17:47","slug":"bombshell-emails-show-the-biden-administration-colluded-with-big-tech-to-censor-covid-misinformation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/bombshell-emails-show-the-biden-administration-colluded-with-big-tech-to-censor-covid-misinformation\/","title":{"rendered":"Bombshell Emails Show The Biden Administration Colluded With Big Tech To Censor Covid \u2018Misinformation\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fbombshell-emails-show-the-biden-administration-colluded-with-big-tech-to-censor-covid-misinformation%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1630081&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The federal government actively colluded with Big Tech over the past year to censor conversations about covid that they thought contained false or inaccurate information, according to newly released emails.<\/p>\n<p>Obtained via a lawsuit filed against top-ranking Biden administration officials by Missouri and Louisiana Attorneys General (AG) Eric Schmitt and Jeff Landry for \u201ccolluding with social media companies to censor free speech,\u201d the communication records show members of federal agencies, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), coordinating with social media platforms on how to handle \u201cmisinformation\u201d regarding the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"9owsO5sFGSzMtiAQPhBkdoLKlt3SwcWDYV7IuCFDacaV38jWPkXJvRiNImNQbfggxH57jZGJzv21L\"><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\ud83d\udea8In May, Missouri and Louisiana filed a landmark lawsuit against top ranking Biden Admin. officials for colluding with social media companies to censor free speech. We have already received documents that show their cozy relationship, and now we\u2019re demanding more.\ud83d\udea8<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Attorney General Eric Schmitt (@AGEricSchmitt) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AGEricSchmitt\/status\/1565346263310118913?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 1, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>In an email dated July 16, 2021, addressed to U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, a senior representative for Facebook discussed how the company and Biden administration officials met \u201cto better understand the scope of what the White House expects from [Facebook] on misinformation going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn our previous conversations, I\u2019ve appreciated the way you and your team have approached our engagement, and we have worked hard to meet the moment \u2014 we\u2019ve dedicated enormous time and resources to fighting this pandemic and consider ourselves to be partners in fighting the same battle,\u201d the Facebook official wrote.<\/p>\n<p>The email to Murthy came a day after the Surgeon General\u2019s issuance of an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hhs.gov\/about\/news\/2021\/07\/15\/us-surgeon-general-issues-advisory-during-covid-19-vaccination-push-warning-american.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Advisory<\/a> warning against the \u201cthreat of health misinformation,\u201d in which Murthy called on \u201ctech and social media companies\u201d to \u201cdo more to address the spread on their platforms.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to the communication logs released by Schmitt, the same senior Facebook representative later sent an email to an official within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), in which Facebook thanked the HHS rep for \u201ctaking the time to meet\u201d and expand upon the steps the company took with respect to removing \u201cmisinformation\u201d and \u201cfurther address the \u2018disinfo dozen.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201c[W]e removed 17 additional Pages, Groups, and Instagram accounts tied to the disinfo dozen (so a total of 39 Profiles, Groups, and IG accounts deleted thus far, resulting in every member of the disinfo dozen having had at least one such entity removed),\u201d the email reads. \u201cWe are also continuing to make 4 other Pages and Profiles, which have not yet met their removal thresholds, more difficult to find on our platform. We also expanded the group of false claims that we remove to keep up with recent trends of misinformation that we are seeing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A separate document addressed to Surgeon General Murthy also shows additional steps Facebook took to censor Americans on the platform, including \u201cincreasing the strength\u201d of \u201cdemotions for COVID and vaccine-related content that third-party fact checkers rate as \u2018Partly False\u2019 or \u2018Missing Context\u2019 so that any such information would \u201cdemoted at the same strength that [Facebook] demote[s] any content\u201d rated as \u201cFalse.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The cozy relationship between Facebook and federal health agencies like the CDC didn\u2019t stop there, with the two entities often holding regular meetings to discuss the latter\u2019s censorship efforts. <\/p>\n<p>In an email chain dated July 28, 2021, a senior Facebook official asked the CDC if \u201cin addition to [their] weekly meetings,\u201d the CDC would be interested in \u201cdoing a monthly misinfo\/debunking meeting, with maybe claim topics communicated a few days prior so that [the CDC] can bring in matching experts and chat casually for 30 minutes or so.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYes, we would love to do that,\u201d a CDC official replied.<\/p>\n<p>The Biden administration\u2019s assault on free speech wasn\u2019t exclusive to covid-19, however. On July 20, 2021, Digital Director for the White House Covid-19 Response Team Clarke Humphrey sent an email to Facebook asking if the group could remove a parody Instagram account of Dr. Anthony Fauci.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHi there \u2014 any way we can get this pulled down? It is not actually one of ours,\u201d Humphrey said, to which a Facebook official replied, \u201cYep, on it!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In addition to Facebook, Twitter also made efforts to collude with the federal government regarding Covid. The <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AGEricSchmitt\/status\/1565346329068351490?s=20&amp;t=oVOGAcdA1TKBVXVFO-Z-_w\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">emails<\/a> also show Twitter asking to set up regular meetings with government health officials to \u201cexamine trends\u201d regarding \u201cproblematic content,\u201d such as fraudulent \u201ccovid cures\u201d and \u201cvaccine cards.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Other examples of coordination between the federal government and Big Tech companies include the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency reaching out \u201cto Twitter, Google, Meta, and Microsoft\u201d this past May \u201cfollowing the botched rollout of DHS\u2019 Disinformation Governance Board.\u201d Furthermore, in February 2022, the Deputy Secretary at the Biden Treasury Department had an inquiry sent to Facebook to set connect and \u201cdiscuss potential influence operations on social media.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe discovery provided so far demonstrates that this Censorship Enterprise is extremely broad, including officials in the White House, HHS, DHS, CISA, the CDC, NIAID, and the Office of the Surgeon General; and evidently other agencies as well, such as the Census Bureau, the FDA, the FBI, the State Department, the Treasury Department, and the U.S. Election Assistance Commission,\u201d Schmitt and Landry said in a <a href=\"https:\/\/ago.mo.gov\/home\/news\/2022\/09\/01\/missouri-and-louisiana-attorneys-general-ask-court-to-compel-department-of-justice-to-produce-communications-between-top-officials-and-social-media-companies\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">joint statement<\/a>. \u201cAnd it rises to the highest levels of the U.S. Government, including numerous White House officials.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The release of the bombshell emails comes following <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/08\/30\/zuckerbergs-admission-of-fbi-meddling-in-2020-election-is-even-bigger-than-it-seems\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">confirmation<\/a> by Meta (Facebook) CEO Mark Zuckerberg that the FBI interfered in the 2020 presidential election by pressuring his company to \u201ccensor Russian misinformation \u2014 and thus the Hunter Biden laptop story.\u201d<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Shawn Fleetwood is a Staff Writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-comments mt-30 mt-sm-60\">\n<div class=\"article-comments-container d-flex flex-column align-items-center py-30\">\n    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"110\" height=\"106\" src=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/fdrlst-mark.svg\" class=\"img-fluid mb-20\" alt=\"The Federalist logo eagle mark\" \/>    <\/p>\n<p>Unlock commenting by joining the Federalist Community.<\/p>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/plans\/pricing\/\" class=\"btn btn-on-white\">Subscribe<\/a>  <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The federal government actively colluded with Big Tech over the past year to censor conversations about covid that they thought contained false or inaccurate information, according to newly released emails.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":539,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1630081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/539"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1630081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1630081\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1630081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1630081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1630081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}