US senator and presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren is continuing her attack on Facebook, placing a ‘fake’ ad on the platform to highlight policies around political misinformation.
Warren, who is an advocate for breaking up big tech companies like Facebook, ran an ad last week which falsely stated Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg had just endorsed Donald Trump for re-election.
“You’re probably shocked, and you might be thinking, ‘how could this possibly be true?’
“Well, it’s not. (Sorry.) But what Zuckerberg *has* done is given Donald Trump free rein to lie on his platform — and then pay Facebook gobs of money to push out their lies to American voters.”
While Facebook does ban ads that present untrue statements, such as anti-vaccination propaganda, the policies differ around politicians.
In her ‘fake’ ad, Warren is referring to an ad Trump took out which claim claimed that Joe Biden “PROMISED Ukraine $US1 BILLION DOLLARS if they fired the prosecutor investigating his son’s company”.
Following Warren’s ad, Facebook tagged the presidential candidate in a tweet comparing itself to broadcast television stations that shared the same Trump ad.
“FCC doesn’t want broadcast companies censoring candidates’ speech,” Facebook said in the tweet. “We agree it’s better to let voters — not companies — decide.”
@ewarren looks like broadcast stations across the country have aired this ad nearly 1,000 times, as required by law. FCC doesn’t want broadcast companies censoring candidates’ speech. We agree it’s better to let voters—not companies—decide. #FCC #candidateuse https://t.co/WlWePjh1vZ
— Meta Newsroom (@MetaNewsroom) October 12, 2019
Warren soon quipped back: “You’re making my point here. It’s up to you whether you take money to promote lies.”
You’re making my point here. It’s up to you whether you take money to promote lies. You can be in the disinformation-for-profit business, or you can hold yourself to some standards. In fact, those standards were in your policy. Why the change? https://t.co/CE766Jpwoo
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) October 13, 2019
