Congressman Matt Gaetz has filed a criminal referral against Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for “making materially false statements to Congress while under oath” during two joint hearings on April 10, 2018 and April 11, 2018.
During the hearings, Zuckerberg was asked about Facebook’s bias against conservatives several times and said “there is absolutely no directive in any of the changes that we make to have a bias in anything we do.”
However, a series of recent undercover investigations from Project Veritas have shown several of Facebook’s content moderators stating that they take down pro-Trump posts for “revenge” and discussing their plans to “delete all Republicans” on their last day.
Former Facebook content moderator Zach McElroy told Project Veritas that the company’s automated system that flags content for the moderators to review had been programmed to seek out posts and comments favorable to Republicans and that he saw “upwards of 75-80%” of the posts in the queue were from “politicians, journalists, and pages that supported conservatives or the President.”
McElroy also said that Facebook distributed an internal memo telling the moderators to leave a violent anti-Trump meme up because it didn’t break the rules on violence and incitement while at the same time banning a cartoon anti-Democrat meme for violence and incitement.
Gaetz wrote that these Project Veritas investigations show “ample evidence” of “bias and manipulation” against “conservative speech, persons, policies, or politics.”
Gaetz added: “These facts are in direct contrast to Mr. Zuckerberg’s testimony before Congress.”
Gaetz is urging Attorney General William Barr and the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate Zuckerberg for potential violations of laws that require truthful testimony to Congress.
“As a member of this body, I question Mr. Zuckerberg’s veracity, and challenge his willingness to cooperate with our oversight authority, diverting congressional resources during time-sensitive investigations, and materially impeding our work. Such misrepresentations are not only unfair, they are potentially illegal and fraudulent,” Gaetz wrote.
Project Veritas founder and CEO James O’Keefe said: “If someone—anyone—lies to a lawmaker, he or she is deliberately manipulating the legislative process. I urge DOJ to act quickly and investigate Mark Zuckerberg before Americans vote in November.”
