The billionaire Meta CEO announced Monday that three powerful social media platforms – Facebook, Instagram and Threads – will end the use of third-party fact-checkers and replace them with a system similar to the use of Community Notes on X, formerly Twitter.
X, through Community Notes, allows users to add context to posts they believe are misleading or are in need of clarification. Users can write notes that provide additional information or explanations, helping readers better understand the content.
The goal, according to X, is to reduce misinformation by providing peer-reviewed corrections directly on posts.
Zuckerberg made the announcement in a Meta post that has gotten mixed reviews about his honesty and his motives after the Nov. 5 election put Trump back in office.
Zuckerberg visited him at Mar-a-Lago three weeks after he won the White House with both electoral votes and the popular vote.
During the Biden term, social media sites quietly and obediently censored posts at the direction of the federal government if the comments were labeled "misinformation" by the Feds.
Back in August, a letter from Zuckerberg to the House Judiciary Committee said his company was "pressured" into "censoring" content, even humorous and satirical posts, during the pandemic.
“We’re going back to our roots," Zuckberg said this week, "and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms."
“The fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created,” he said.
Meta will remove restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are “just out of touch with mainstream discourse.” The restrictions have been used too frequently to shut down differing opinions, and it has “gone too far.”
Heavy-handed restrictions seemed to affect conservative-minded posts the most, leading to the absence of trust in his products that Zuckerberg bemoaned in his announcement.
For some, there was no forgiveness for what was done and who was hurt by it. Dr. Simone Gold, a COVID-19 vaccine skeptic, blasted Zuckerberg and his social media platform in an X post.
"We exposed the truth to the public and got over 20 million views within 24 hours," she wrote. "Zuckerberg shut us down and banned our pages and accounts."
For others, that trust was won back on Tuesday.
“We have certainly complained, those of us on the Right, for a long time about how these 'unbiased fact-checkers' were really just partisan left-leaning censorship shops,” Stefan Padfield, director of the Free Enterprise Project at the National Center for Public Policy Research, said on Washington Watch Tuesday.
“This does seem to be a step in the right direction," Padfield continued, "but as always, we do have reason to be cautious in our enthusiasm for these changes as well.”
Trump targeted Zuckerberg, social media
Trump was highly critical of social media companies during the campaign, referencing them as part of a “censorship cartel.” He specifically targeted Facebook, Twitter – from which he was banned before Elon Musk purchased it – and other platforms.
Referring to Zuckerberg himself, Trump has vowed the billionaire would "spend the rest of his life in prison" if he interfered in the 2024 election. That threat came after Zuckerberg donated a whopping $400 million during the 2020 election. The donation, which was supposedly non-partisan, ultimately helped Joe Biden.
The Supreme Court, branded conservative and constantly subjected to verbal attacks from the Left, ruled in favor of the Biden administration in late June in a case involving allegations of collusion with Big Tech companies to censor social media posts.
The case was dismissed only because the majority ruled the attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri lacked standing to bring the case.
Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch dissented, writing the actions of the administration were “blatantly unconstitutional.”
The question now is whether Zuckerberg’s renewed passion for free speech would be in place had Kamala Harris defeated Trump on Nov. 5? If the results were reversed, would we be having this conversation?
“I don’t think we would at all,” Padfield said.
He told show host Tony Perkins it “certainly seems like it’s the primarily the election results, right? He saw what happened, and he took that in.”
Padfield said Zuckerberg is responding like any “good capitalist and taking the feedback, seeing the direction of the country, what his customers want, which is free speech, and then providing it.”
Motive aside, the move, if upheld, is a win for free speech and likely a win for Meta’s bottom line.
“This doesn’t mean that his own political views have necessarily changed or that the makeup of the internal employees at Facebook, that their overall political leanings have changed," Padfield observed. "It clearly would not have happened, I think that’s what he’s telling us, without the election.”
'It seems rather convenient'
Reacting to Zuckerberg's announcement on the air, American Family Radio host Abraham Hamilton agreed the election is motivating Zuckerberg but believes there are other factors in play.
For CEOs, the thought of the bottom line is never far away. One possible motivation is to get in line with the Trump administration to position Meta for research and development grants, Hamilton said.
“It seems rather convenient to me that this is happening,” Hamilton told his AFR audience.
Another motivation could be as simple as market competition.
“I believe he’s beginning to realize other platforms are beginning to outpace him in authentic engagement, and he has to make a move," Hamilton said. "One thing 'Zuckerbucks' knows is the proverbial maxim for entrepreneurship, change or die."
Hamilton, an attorney, reminded his audience Zuckerberg cooperated with the Biden administration to censor content, including the story of the Hunter Biden laptop. So he cautioned that it's unlikely the billionaire has suddenly warmed to free speech and the First Amendment.
