Facebook is banning new political ads before election day. What’s really happening?
Summary
In an official statement this morning, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook would not accept any new political ads for dissemination on their platform the week prior to the election.
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He also committed to “removing misinformation” about elections by partnering with local and national officials to combat misleading narratives.
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Facebook will also widen the criteria for content to be removed under its voter suppression and misinformation policies, and generally seek to take more responsibility for the role that Facebook ads play in influencing elections for Americans.
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Zuckerberg said that he was making the changes in response to the threat of “civil unrest” during the election cycle.
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Points out that this policy is too little, too late
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Argues that by not vowing to remove or ban lies from the platform, the policy “won’t change anything“
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Calls the policy a band-aid, not a long-term solution
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Frames the policy as an attack on Trump
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Does not report widely on the announcement, instead focusing on the internal strife happening at Facebook surrounding the Black Lives Matter movement
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Lauds Zuckerberg for upholding democracy in the midst of left-wing misinformation.
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© Evelyn Torsher, 2020
