In the midst of the drama of the 2020 Presidential elections, Donald Trump was banned by multiple social media platforms, following his statements involving the raid of Capitol Hill on January 6th, 2021. While these companies claim that he was suspended from his accounts in order to protect the safety and credibility of content on the app, many of President Trump’s supporters had some complaints. In the days following, companies like Facebook were accused of censoring conservative-based content. Although these apps have machine-run fact-checking and censorship systems, many people believed they had a liberal bias. In the rise of it all, conservative political commentator, Candace Owens, uploaded a video to YouTube expressing her opinions on the situation. She makes many claims in her video that are not necessarily blacked up by any proof, or research. By looking at these claims and comparing them to the actual facts and evidence of the situation, one can determine if the points Candace Owens presented might bring up some concerns about the fairness of Facebook’s fact checkers.

1.“They [liberals] hatched a plan to silence […] conservatives, and facebook is paying them for it” (0:53)

The first claim this video makes involves the left hatching a plan with Facebook in order to silence conservative voices. Owens claims that “they [liberals] applied extreme pressure to silence or censor ‘fake news’ […] Facebook bent to that pressure, and created a fact-checker network with god-like powers over all of us” (1:23). She goes on to state that Facebook is paying liberals in order to make this happen. There are many reasons why this claim is most likely false. For starters, following the Capitol Hill riots, Trump was not only banned from Facebook, but also Twitter, Youtube, Snapchat, Twitch, and more. This leads most to assume that other platforms were experiencing issues with the reliability and safety of Trump’s content as well. According to BBC, Facebook released a statement following the suspension of Donald Trump’s accounts: “Given the gravity of the circumstances that led to Mr Trump’s suspension, we believe his actions constituted a severe violation of our rules which merit the highest penalty available.” (qtd. in Facebook Suspends Trump). Other companies released statements similar to this. Thus, it is safe to say that Facebook was experiencing issues with his content either way. Before Trump’s account was suspended, he had many posts hidden, or censored by Facebook. In an article for The Daily Wire, another statement by the company is shown: “His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the US and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because we judged that their effect — and likely their intent — would be to provoke further violence.” (qtd. in Haworth). As the attacks and raids at Capitol Hill unraveled, Trump seemed to be provoking these actions. In order to maintain the safety of the app’s users, and other citizens, Facebook decided to remove the President’s statements. Even if liberals were involved in the censorship of conservative content, Facebook noticed an unsafe influence involved in his posts anyway. Not only was Trump’s account suspended, but other Facebook groups were removed from the app for similar reasons. While it seems that Candace Owens believes the company had no good reason to censor these accounts, that can be proven false. According to Snopes, “The company said that it took the action because it found the networks used “fake accounts as a central part of their operations to mislead people about who they are and what they are doing.” All three groups described below in our reporting appeared to fall into this same category of offense, with admin slots filled by fake or duplicate accounts for the same people” (Liles). Facebook claimed that they felt it was appropriate to delete the conservative groups, as they were violating the app’s guidelines regarding coordinated inauthentic behavior. While these statements do not completely rule out the possible idea that liberals could somehow be behind Facebook’s fact-checking system, the app had many valid reasons to censor him either way.

2. Facebook fact checkers are “untrue”, and “run by partisan beta leftists” (1:46)

The video makes another very extreme claim, stating that Facebook’s fact-checking system is false, and what is actually determining the censorship of content is partisan beta leftists. One thing that counters this claim is the following statement made by Facebook: “Instead, we will simply apply our newsworthiness balancing test in the same way to all content, measuring whether the public interest value of the content outweighs the potential risk of harm by leaving it up” (Facebook Suspends Trump). According to BBC, the company explained this as their plan for how they went about the decision to suspend Trump. This shows that on the authority of Facebook, the reviewed content on the app is tested by a fair test, performed on all content. Owens also claims that what is behind these fact-checkers, are partisan beta leftists. According to Breitbart, however, “the company [Facebook] says its AI systems “proactively detect” around 97 percent of hate speech content that is removed by the platform, meaning that most censorship on Facebook is facilitated by machines” (Nolan). This proves that most of the censorship of content on the app is not run by partisan leftists, but rather, unbiased machines. Another concern Candace Owens voices involving her theory, is that “Freedom [of speech] infuriates the left” (0:46). Owens thinks that the liberals who are allegedly behind Facebook’s fact-checking network are against free speech. In reality, as stated by BBC, “The independent board, which is funded by Facebook, has 20 members who are able to make binding decisions on content. Among the members are legal scholars, journalists, freedom of speech experts and a former prime minister of Denmark” (Facebook Suspends Trump). This quote involves a list of people on the board behind Facebook’s fact-checking system. Listed here are freedom of speech experts, which counters Owens’ claim that the people in charge of the app’s censorship are against free speech. The idea that Facebook’s fact-checkers are run by partisan beta leftists can be proven false by taking a look at the individual people and machines behind the system.

3. Alan Duke: head of Lead Stories, former CNN employee (3:16)

One expert listed in the video is Alan Duke. According to Owens, Duke “makes a living cannibalizing and slandering conservative content and creators” (3:21). Owens claims that Alan Duke’s website, Lead Stories, has published false and misleading news stories, including one that went after her own content. With this already creating a heavy bias on Owens’ part, she goes on to make many questionable statements about Duke. As stated by The Wall Street Journal, “the former CNN producer’s company, Lead Stories, helps Facebook Inc. FB -1.03% and other social-media platforms limit the spread of virus-related misinformation by flagging it as false” (Hudson). Previous to his job at Lead Stories, Duke worked for a news company, CNN, which is notorious for being liberal biased. He introduced fact-checking to Facebook around a year before President Trump’s suspension: “since its first coronavirus fact check in mid-January, Lead Stories has fact checked more than 200 viral coronavirus claims” (Hudson). It’s not just Owens who believes Duke’s fact-checking system is false. It has caused an uproar from users, complaining about their content being censored or debunked. Duke has found the reason why: “It’s embarrassing when it shows up in their timeline that they shared something that’s wrong. That’s not something we’ve been through before with fact checking—this is much more personal” (qtd. In Hudson). Overall, although Owens claims Duke is unreliable, according to his credentials, he seems to be quite the opposite.

4. “The communist party of China has more say over my [conservative] content than the First Amendment” (4:15)

Owens’ video concludes with this claim. After she explains the issues she has allegedly experienced with Facebook’s fact-checkers, she goes on to say that the reason why Lead Stories is not reliable, is because it is funded by a company called ByteDance. “It’s a Beijing based company that owns the TikTok spyware app” (3:50). First of all, Owens refers to TikTok as a “spyware app”. Which by itself, is mainly backed up by rumors. According to Forbes, “TikTok is firmly in the sights of the Trump administration, and they’re not letting up” (Doffman). While many people have genuine concerns about TikTok’s security, it seems that Owens’ opinion is mainly influenced by other faulty claims in her political party. Tiktok claims otherwise: “with decades of U.S. military and law enforcement experience, and a U.S. team that works diligently to develop a best-in-class security infrastructure” (qtd. in Doffman). Tiktok’s statement explains that their security is backed up by military and law enforcement experience. Later on in the article, this is re-ensured: “the company also reassures that U.S. data never travels to China” (Doffman). In her video, Owens states that Tiktok is compromised by the communist party of China. She wraps this back into the main point of her video, saying “Facebook is paying for fact-checkers funded by an arm of the Communist party of China” (4:04). However, his claim is proved wrong multiple times by Tiktok itself.

5. “Facebook is trying to delete us [conservative accounts]” (0:01)

Owens introduces her video with the claim that Facebook is trying to delete conservative accounts. While one of the only instances that provides evidence to this is Trump’s suspension, other political commentators back her up: “facebook, the world’s biggest social network, has denied access to its megaphone to a man who 74 million people voted for. They didn’t just know him, or approve of him; they voted for him to be US president. That is a big call” (qtd. in Facebook Suspends Trump). This quote is from another conservative politician, who believes Facebook was in the wrong for banning Trump’s account. According to The Free Speech Center, “government officials have the ability to use social media to advocate and engage in their own expression. This expression becomes the speech of the government under the government speech doctrine, a doctrinal principle in First Amendment law that recognizes that government has the ability to be an active participant in the marketplace of ideas” (Hudson). This statement claims that it is the politician’s right to express their views through social media under the FIrst Amendment. While many people are mad about the situation, it all boils down to Facebook’s rights as a business. Whether or not people think it is fair, if someone is violating the company’s guidelines, they have the right to take action. According to Breitbart, “Facebook Vice President of Global Affairs Nick Clegg stated in a recent op-ed that Facebook shouldn’t be hampered by regulation so that it can be free to spread its technology worldwide but also American values such as “free expression”. (Nolan). The company provides many statements against Owens’ claim, saying that they are not against conservative accounts, but rather, they will not follow regulations that will not allow them to delete misleading accounts.

Conclusion

With Owens’ lawsuit against Lead Stories still in action, we cannot say for sure what the outcome of her video of this is. What we can predict, however, is that Owens will not win. With several of her claims proving to be false and misleading, she is not a very tough enemy to compete against. Since Owens’ video, Facebook has continued to fact check posts all throughout their platform, including liberal content. With the help of Alan Duke, these fact-checkers are performing on many other platforms, and it seems they will continue running, even after Owens’ lawsuit. Thus, although Owens’ may be going after Facebook’s fact checkers for being “misleading”, it is safe to say that it’s not challenging to fact check her for being just that.

Featured image is a screenshot from the video “Facebook CENSORED a sitting President. None of us are safe!”