{"id":2247133,"date":"2024-05-17T17:52:02","date_gmt":"2024-05-17T21:52:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ex-disinformation-chief-told-to-be-as-vague-as-possible-amid-board-collapse-transcript\/"},"modified":"2024-05-17T17:56:08","modified_gmt":"2024-05-17T21:56:08","slug":"ex-disinformation-chief-told-to-be-as-vague-as-possible-amid-board-collapse-transcript","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ex-disinformation-chief-told-to-be-as-vague-as-possible-amid-board-collapse-transcript\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Disinformation Chief advised to be intentionally vague during board collapse: Transcript"},"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\">24<\/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%2Fex-disinformation-chief-told-to-be-as-vague-as-possible-amid-board-collapse-transcript%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=2247133&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>Nina\u2062 Jankowicz, \u2064the ex-Disinformation Governance Board\u200c leader, testified to Congress about the Department of Homeland Security&#8217;s lack of transparency that contributed to the board&#8217;s collapse. Jankowicz faced restrictions on disclosing details and felt\u2063 abandoned post-resignation. Her outspokenness exposed internal struggles and political biases that fueled\u2064 controversies surrounding the\u2062 board&#8217;s impartiality and censorship \u2062concerns.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2879315\/bidens-controversial-disinformation-board-suspended-after-wave-of-criticism\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Nina Jankowicz<\/a>, the former face of the short-lived Disinformation Governance Board, revealed to Congress that the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/homeland-security\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Department of Homeland Security<\/a> was intentionally opaque in the face of overwhelming criticism that led to the board\u2019s collapse.<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz spoke to lawmakers during a deposition about the department\u2019s internal decisions to address widespread concerns about the floundering board. The deposition took place last April, but after it was broached during a hearing this week, House Judiciary Committee members agreed to release a <a href=\"https:\/\/judiciary.house.gov\/sites\/evo-subsites\/republicans-judiciary.house.gov\/files\/evo-media-document\/Jankowicz%20Transcript_Redacted.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>transcript<\/a> of it on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz said during the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/don-jr-i-wont-jump-on-bandwagon-to-cancel-sen-cruz\/\" title=\"Don Jr.: I won\u2019t jump on bandwagon to cancel Sen. Cruz\">closed-door interview<\/a> that her superiors prohibited her from taking a transparent approach when she repeatedly asked to give on-the-record details about the board.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe guidance from up above was that we were to be as vague as possible, which I found very frustrating,\u201d Jankowicz said.<\/p>\n<p>She said she directly received the guidance from her colleague Jen Daskal, a lawyer and co-chair of the board, but that she believed the instruction \u201cwas coming from elsewhere in the building.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz served as executive director of the disinformation board for just over two months, from March to May 2022, but she resigned amid intense backlash from Republicans who were skeptical of the board\u2019s impartiality and accused it of seeking to censor right-leaning viewpoints. DHS dissolved the board soon after Jankowicz\u2019s exit.<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz was outspoken after her resignation about how DHS had, in her view, botched the rollout of the board and failed to address criticisms. She went further in her deposition, however, saying that in addition to actively suppressing details about the board, she also felt DHS abandoned her and let her serve as a scapegoat.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do believe I was thrown under the bus to some degree,\u201d Jankowicz said. \u201cI believe DHS made the calculation that it was easier to let the work be undermined than steal themselves and get on with something that they thought was important.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As soon as DHS announced the board, concerns immediately began to swirl that it would stifle right-leaning perspectives, and Jankowicz\u2019s Biden-friendly political views, which she had publicized in part through <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/npr-suspends-editor-who-wrote-essay-critiquing-outlets-viewpoint-bias\/\" title=\"NPR editor suspended for critiquing bias in outlet's viewpoints\">past online posts<\/a>, fueled worries on the Right.<\/p>\n<p>Unearthed posts on X showed Jankowicz <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2374643\/biden-disinformation-chief-nina-jankowicz-pushed-trump-russia-collusion-claims\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>lending<\/a> credence to Christopher Steele, author of an infamous and discredited dossier,\u00a0and persistently <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2623495\/biden-disinformation-chief-a-trump-dossier-author-fan-and-hunter-biden-laptop-doubter\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>casting<\/a> doubts on the <em>New York Post\u2019s<\/em> story about Hunter Biden\u2019s laptop. Jankowicz, who previously worked as a policy adviser for the Biden campaign, was featured in a spurt of headlines that she said became so aggressive that she received death threats.<\/p>\n<p>However, she would not speak during the deposition about her partisan <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/why-this-average-american-is-voting-for-donald-trump\/\" title=\"Why This Average American Is Voting for Donald Trump\">social media<\/a> posts, repeatedly claiming that her political views before joining the board lacked relevance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am not going to answer questions that are not pertinent on the advice of my attorney,\u201d she said of the posts.<\/p>\n<p>She also reiterated comments she has made in the past about how DHS allowed perspectives from the Right to overpower it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did not provide enough information at the outset. We left a vacuum for people to speculate. And indeed, within hours of the board being announced, the phrase \u2018ministry of truth\u2019 \u2014 which, again, the board had nothing to do with being a ministry of truth \u2014 was trending on social media,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz\u2019s deposition transcript comes as the Biden administration, and DHS in particular, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2584727\/house-republicans-push-to-ban-dhs-from-establishing-another-disinformation-governance-board\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>continues<\/a> to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/policy\/technology\/2952803\/stanford-researcher-dhs-2020-election-censorship\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>take<\/a> heat for coordinating with or pressuring outside parties, such as social media companies, to censor information it finds faulty. A case before the Supreme Court, <em>Murthy v<\/em>. <em>Missouri<\/em>, is set to determine this year whether the executive branch violated the First Amendment by dictating how social media companies should moderate their content.<\/p>\n<p>Jankowicz, for her part, has continued her work on tackling \u201cdisinformation\u201d on the nonprofit stage, announcing last month that she founded the American Sunlight Project.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Her first order of business was to send a public letter to the congressional members, namely Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and James Comer (R-KY), who investigated her and DHS for censorship.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDisinformation knows no political party. Its ultimate victim is democracy. This threat is growing more acute each day, and you have become the primary obstacle to addressing it,\u201d Jankowicz told the lawmakers.<\/p>\n<p><em>Gabe Kaminsky contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Nina Jankowicz, ex-head of Disinformation Governance Board, disclosed to Congress the Department of Homeland Security&#8217;s deliberate lack of transparency amid heavy scrutiny leading to the board&#8217;s demise. In a deposition, Jankowicz discussed DHS&#8217;s internal moves to tackle the board&#8217;s issues<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":2247134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP22140068127766-1024x683.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2247133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP22140068127766-1024x683.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2247133","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\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2247133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2247133\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2247134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2247133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2247133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2247133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}