BUSTED: Project Veritas exposes Facebook contractors who purposely censor conservatives, Trump supporters in violation of company policies
06/24/2020 / By JD Heyes
For years, conservatives and pro-Trump media have complained that the social media behemoth platforms we’ve all come to rely on for reach and as a big part of our revenue model were engaging in censorship of our content.
In addition to anecdotal evidence, researchers proved that tech giants Google, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and others were systematically censoring, hiding or downgrading conservative content and conservative thinkers. They even have the power to change elections.
Now, a new video released Tuesday by Project Veritas features content moderation contractors for Facebook admitting they not only censor conservatives and pro-Trump related content, but they have given race-baiter CNN host Don Lemon a break over content that normally would have required the platform to disavow and delete it.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently stressed the company’s commitment to freedom of speech in an op-ed for USA Today. But an undercover investigation by Project Veritas into the world of Facebook’s third-party content moderators casts doubt on that commitment.
The investigation revealed the liberal culture fostered inside Cognizant, a company under contract with Facebook to remove the content as it sees fit. Project Veritas insider Zach McElroy stated that in the Civic Harassment Queue at Cognizant, “I saw upwards of 75 to 80 percent of the posts in that queue were from Republican pages.”
He notes that the Civic Harassment Queue is a list of all posts that have been flagged by moderators for various violations of Community Guidelines.
“So, for 75 to 80 percent of the posts to be targeting Republicans and conservatives, you can say it was a bot. But somebody had to design that algorithm. So really, somebody at Facebook,” he told Project Veritas’ James O’Keefe.
In the video, one unnamed moderator claimed that it’s just “common sense” to ditch posts that have the hashtag #MAGA in them (‘common sense’ only if you’re a hypocrite Leftist who thinks the First Amendment’s free speech guarantee only applies to your political speech).
**Warning: Language
One undercover PJ journalist asked, “If you see a conservative post you just get rid of it, right?”
The unnamed moderator responded, saying, “Yes! I don’t give no f**ks, I’ll delete it.”
In addition, Daniel Will, a Cognizant content moderator, said to the camera, “Facebook shadow bans. Facebook is notorious for it, they say they don’t but, it’s clear that people’s content don’t come because it’s been de-filtered off the queue.”
“How many of you are like, take your own stance and say we’re just deleting whatever, all the Trump posts?” someone asked on camera.
An unnamed moderator said, “There are probably like 16 of us.”
It’s also clear that Facebook, via it’s content moderators at a bare minimum, is engaged in election interference. One service delivery manager was caught on camera admitting, “Gotta get the Cheeto (Trump) out of office.”
This isn’t the first time James O’Keefe and his team of undercover journalists have caught Facebook censoring Republican and pro-Trump content, as Natural News reported in February 2019:
According to a lengthy report published by the group online, a former high-level Facebook employee-turned-whistleblower has provided damning evidence in the form of documents that show how the social media behemoth, through its technology and algorithms, purposely limits exposure of written and video content posted by conservative figures and news organizations.
The info provided by the former insider “describes how Facebook engineers plan and go about policing political speech,” Project Veritas said in a press release. “Screenshots from a Facebook workstation show the specific technical sections taken against political figures, as well as ‘[e]xisting strategies’ taken to combat political speech.
Is anyone home at the Federal Election Commission or the Federal Communications Commission?
Sources include:
Tagged Under: 2020 election, Censorship, conservative content, conservatives, election meddling, Facebook, James O'Keefe, President Trump, Project Veritas, shadow ban
