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Joe Biden's campaign declared war on Facebook, accusing it of failing to live up to its promises to rein in Trump

Sinéad Baker   

Joe Biden's campaign declared war on Facebook, accusing it of failing to live up to its promises to rein in Trump
Tech1 min read
  • Joe Biden's campaign declared war on Facebook over what it called a failure to properly police misinformation from his Republican rival, President Donald Trump.
  • The campaign said Facebook had not lived up to its own promises to clamp down on misinformation on topics like voting.
  • It argued that Facebook had instead become worse since promising to step up its moderation.
  • Biden staffers threatened to repeatedly call out Facebook for the remaining 36 days of the election cycle.

The Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, has attacked Facebook over its handling of posts by his Republican rival, President Donald Trump, and argued that the platform is not keeping its promises to fight misinformation.

Axios published a three-page later by Biden's campaign manager, Jen O'Malley Dillon, to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

It said the platform had failed to stop misinformation about the election and had actually gotten worse since making public commitments.

"Earlier this month, Facebook committed to finally acting on its 'responsibility to protect our democracy' by 'clearing up confusion about how this election will work' and by 'fight[ing] misinformation' about how to participate," the email said.

"On the same day, Mr. Trump took to your platform to spread falsehoods about mail voting, and Facebook took no meaningful action.

"We were told then that Facebook was working to determine how best to apply its new, more aggressive approach.

"Three weeks have now passed. Rather than seeing progress, we have seen regression."

Facebook has come under huge pressure to prevent the spread of misinformation during the coronavirus pandemic and in the run-up to the US presidential election.

Trump's posts have been a special challenge. They include his sharing opinions about mail-in voting that contradict expert views and appearing to encourage people to illegally vote twice.

The Biden campaign letter said Facebook had failed to do what it promised and threatened to repeatedly call out the company until Election Day.

The letter said: "As you say, 'voting is voice.' Facebook has committed to not allow that voice to be drowned out by a storm of disinformation, but has failed at every opportunity to follow through on that commitment.

"We will be calling out those failures as they occur over the coming 36 days."

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