Mark Zuckerberg further distanced himself from the Biden administration during an appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast, where the Meta CEO accused administration officials of screaming to have content taken down.
The subjects centered on COVID-19 and Facebook posts critical of vaccines during the White House’s push to get more Americans vaccinated.
Mr. Zuckerberg said his company was willing to “give a little bit of deference to the government and health authorities” on what to do. But he said eventually White House officials became more hostile to Facebook in their pursuit of having posts removed.
“I mean, basically, these people from the Biden administration would call up our team and like scream at them and curse and it’s like these documents are … kind of out there,” Mr. Zuckerberg said.
His comments follow Meta’s decision to end the company’s diversity, equity and inclusion program, following the lead of other corporations doing away with an initiative that conservatives have heavily criticized, and come after Mr. Zuckerberg paid President-elect Donald Trump a visit to his Mar-a-Lago estate.
When pressed by Mr. Rogan on who in the Biden administration made those demands and whether the calls were recorded, Mr. Zuckerberg said it was just administration officials and that he was unsure if Meta made recordings.
He said that the demands became ridiculous, focusing on content that Mr. Zuckerberg said was truthful.
“They wanted us to take down this meme of Leonardo DiCaprio looking at a TV, talking about how 10 years from now or something, you’re going to see an ad that says, ‘OK, if you took a COVID vaccine, you’re eligible for this kind of payment,’ like sort of a class action lawsuit type meme,” he said. “And they’re like, ‘No, you have to take that down.’”
“We said ‘No, we’re not gonna take down humor and satire, we’re not gonna take down things that are true,’” Mr. Zuckerberg continued.
He reiterated that many of his claims against the White House’s pursuit of removing posts was well-documented.
Indeed, Meta was placed under a microscope by Republicans over allegations that the company colluded with the Biden administration to censor speech on Facebook and became a prime target for House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican.
In a letter sent to Mr. Jordan in August, Mr. Zuckerberg accused the Biden administration of “repeatedly” pressuring the company to “censor certain COVID-19 content.”
“Ultimately it was our decision whether or not to take content down, and we own our decisions, including COVID-19 related changes we made to our enforcement in the wake of this pressure,” he wrote. “I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it.”
He added, “I also think that we made some choices that, with the benefit of hindsight and new information, we wouldn’t make today.”
• Alex Miller can be reached at amiller@washingtontimes.com.