Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement that Facebook and Instagram will end their collaboration with third-party fact checkers and ease some content restrictions has prompted some conservative activists to He praised the move, and cheered it on as “justification” of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. In late 2023, he received a dissenting opinion from the rest of the court in a case regarding content regulation involving posts by former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
The lawsuit comes after Facebook, Meta’s platform, temporarily removed a 30-minute video posted by Kennedy that included vaccine misinformation and other false claims about COVID-19. The dispute centered on whether Meta was acting beyond its scope. A majority of the Supreme Court refused to take up the case without explanation, but Alito, as the court’s lone dissenter, disagreed.
Alito, an appointee of President George W. Bush, said the platform censors a form of political speech to police misinformation and could therefore be seen as acting on behalf of the United States. He strongly criticized the deletion of the video. influence the government, possibly causing him “irreparable” damage.
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Justice Samuel Alito poses for a formal group photo at the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. (Eric Lee/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“Our democratic form of government is undermined when government officials prevent candidates for government office from communicating with voters,” Alito wrote in his dissent. “Such efforts are especially dangerous when the officials conducting them are accountable to their opposing candidates.”
“To ensure that the defendants achieve justice for their claims and prevent irreparable loss of their First Amendment rights, I will allow him to intervene,” he added.
“Because Mr. Kennedy’s arguments on the merits are essentially the same as those of defendant, granting intervention would not materially affect appellant’s burden on that issue,” Alito wrote. “However, the refusal to intervene will likely prevent Mr. Kennedy from vindicating his claims until the spring of 2024, and perhaps no later than June of that year, by which time the presidential campaign will have been several months old. You probably are.”
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Meta and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said in a video posted on social media that his company had gone “too far” and allowed too much political bias from outside fact-checkers. I admitted it. (Joe Rogan Experience)
Earlier this month, Zuckerberg announced that Meta would be rescinding previous content restrictions on Facebook and Instagram (introduced after the 2016 election), and in a video posted on social media, The company admitted it had gone “too far” and allowed too much. Political bias from external fact checkers.
“We have reached a point where there are too many mistakes and too much censorship,” Zuckerberg said in the announcement.
“The recent elections feel like a cultural tipping point to re-prioritize speech, so we need to go back to our roots, reduce mistakes, simplify policies, and restore freedom of expression on our platforms.” I’m going to focus on that.”
He said Meta plans to replace that system with a “community notes” style program similar to the approach taken by social media platform X. Company X is owned by Elon Musk, co-director of the Department of Planned Government Efficiency.
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The news was praised by Molly Hemingway, editor-in-chief of The Federalist, who noted in X that Zuckerberg’s decision “justified” Alito’s dissent. “It was kind of crazy that Zack was saying, ‘What they did must be illegal,’ and the majority of the court was like, ‘I mean, who knows?’ ” Hemingway said of the Supreme Court’s decision not to take up the case.
Brianne Depiche is a political reporter for FOX News Digital, covering the 2024 election and other national news.
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