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Facebook's Fact-checkers Will Stop Checking Trump After Announcement of Presidential Bid (cnn.com) 297

CNN reports: Facebook's fact-checkers will need to stop fact-checking former President Donald Trump following the announcement that he is running for president, according to a company memo obtained by CNN.

While Trump is currently banned from Facebook, the fact-check ban applies to anything Trump says, and false statements made by Trump can be posted to the platform by others. Despite Trump's ban, "Team Trump," a page run by Trump's political group, is still active and has 2.3 million followers.... The carve-out is not exclusive to Trump and applies to all politicians, but given the rate fact-checkers find themselves dealing with claims made by the former president, a manager on Meta's "news integrity partnership" team emailed fact-checkers on Tuesday ahead of Trump's announcement. ...

The company has long had an exception to its fact-checking policy for politicians. "It is not our role to intervene when politicians speak," Meta executive Nick Clegg, a former politician, said in 2019, defending the exemption. The Meta memo sent to fact-checkers made clear that if Trump announced a 2024 presidential bid Tuesday night, he could no longer be fact-checked on the platform. The memo noted that "political speech is ineligible for fact-checking. This includes the words a politician says as well as photo, video, or other content that is clearly labeled as created by the politician or their campaign."

It concluded that "if former President Trump makes a clear, public announcement that he is running for office, he would be considered a politician under our program policies."

Andy Stone, a Meta spokesperson, said the memo was "a reiteration of our long-standing policy" and "should not be news to anyone...."

Meta plans on considering allowing Trump back on the platform as soon as January — two years since his initial ban.

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Facebook's Fact-checkers Will Stop Checking Trump After Announcement of Presidential Bid

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  • As least he has Elon's hand to hold.
    • After doing nothing for two years they will now stop doing anything at all - why were these fact checkers not laid off two years ago already?
      • by Ol Olsoc ( 1175323 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @09:22AM (#63065715)

        After doing nothing for two years they will now stop doing anything at all - why were these fact checkers not laid off two years ago already?

        Because it is very very critical that Facebook's fact checkers check users like you and me, yet Trump can say what he likes, and Facebook promotes it.

        Idea - let's all call ourselves politicians, and post the vilest lies about Zuck! FB cannot/won't do a thing about it

  • by paravis ( 4999401 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:08AM (#63065125)
    Why would they let him spread more of his lies? We need less people like this scum (and Musk) roaming the earth.
    • by stephanruby ( 542433 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:26AM (#63065161)

      Now, we just need our own trolls to run for political office and spread lies about Mark Zuckerberg

      We'll see how well that works.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      Why would they let him spread more of his lies?

      Because it is not Facebook's job to select the next president or to interfere in elections.

      If I lie on Facebook, it is fake news.

      If Trump lies on Facebook, it is real news because a presidential candidate publically spreading lies is newsworthy.

      It is up to the American people to decide whether they want a liar as their president.

      • by Z00L00K ( 682162 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:59AM (#63065201) Homepage Journal

        Just run shadow banning on any politicians.

      • by shanen ( 462549 )

        No. No one decides to be stupid and gullible. Default options set badly for people who can't figure out the settings.

        But con artists love the stupid and gullible suckers. And once again TFG said the quiet part out loud. Stupid leading the stupid, and the puppeteers are laughing all the way to the bank.

        Unless the whole thing is a scam so they can blame TFG for the disasters? Obviously thinking about Twitter now, but the last time I checked it was still running.

        Me? I recently got kicked off of Facebook. Appar

        • by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @03:34AM (#63065311)

          No. No one decides to be stupid and gullible.

          Yes, they do. I know plenty of Trump supporters (mostly relatives), and many of them are quite proud of their ignorance and lack of logic.

          Peter Thiel said about Trump, "The media takes Trump literally but not seriously. His supporters take him seriously, but not literally." So they know he's a liar, but they don't care because he pushes the policies they want.

          • by DrMrLordX ( 559371 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @03:56AM (#63065345)

            Most of the time, it seems like Trump doesn't know the truth. He just says whatever comes to mind. He babbles incessantly.

            • He says what many people *wish* were the truth. More like dreaming out load. It's a valid political strategy. He just takes it to extremes.
              • He says what many people *wish* were the truth. More like dreaming out load. It's a valid political strategy. He just takes it to extremes.

                You make trump sound like a Rhodes scholar. Trump accomplishes this not with careful insightful diction but rather with random nonsensical word vomit like some kind of verbal Rorschach test. That way, to the highly ignorant followers, trump appears to agree with every last moron despite none of them believing exactly the same thing. To the people with functioning brains, it’s painful to even listen to and I believe at least a few professional translators have committed suicide.

                • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:22PM (#63066151) Homepage Journal

                  He says what many people *wish* were the truth. More like dreaming out load. It's a valid political strategy. He just takes it to extremes.

                  You make trump sound like a Rhodes scholar. Trump accomplishes this not with careful insightful diction but rather with random nonsensical word vomit like some kind of verbal Rorschach test.

                  I don't know how much of what he does he understands, but Trump was trained all his life to manipulate people. He definitely does the word vomit thing, but he's apt enough to recognize which words are having positive or negative effects on his crowd. He repeats whichever words do what he wants, which yes does sound very stupid. If you read a transcript it just looks like he's having some kind of big uh-brain event, but if you watch the speech then you can see how it works on his base.

                  It only works on idiots, which is why he had people trying to get out of his latest presidential bid announcement speech before he was done. In fact, the longer he does it to people who still know how to think, the more irritated they get.

                  Speaking of that speech, did you see his face when he brought up the Chinese sham "Quick-Trials" for drug dealers and people cheered? I don't think even he was expecting that.

                  • I don't know how much of what he does he understands, but Trump was trained all his life to manipulate people. He definitely does the word vomit thing, but he's apt enough to recognize which words are having positive or negative effects on his crowd. He repeats whichever words do what he wants, which yes does sound very stupid.

                    It is the very tendrils of reality that bind us both to this existence but also to a functioning democracy. With a critical mass of people hit that are willfully unencumbered by basic facts, it becomes possible to generate a custom broken frame of reasoning each person sets for themself by this skilled verbal diarrhea, it’s classic brainwashing and the diarrhea is the soap. Because no matter how intelligent anyone is, when your consciousness is a broken patchwork of anecdotes that couldn’t al

              • by Creepy ( 93888 )

                You aren't wrong. I take exception to people lying to my face and thinking I am too ignorant to know they are lying. I can barely watch Trump's string of outright lies and made up facts. I miss the old days, where Reagan would not even know the facts (and term 2 was definitely Alzheimer's country...). Great orator, whatever, he just took orders from his minions on cue cards in the US and screwed the country over through bad economic policy (trickle down was, and always will be bullshit - following one econo

          • That's just Peter Thiel babbling. It's quite clear that plenty of supporters do take Trump literally.

          • by drinkypoo ( 153816 ) <drink@hyperlogos.org> on Sunday November 20, 2022 @08:15AM (#63065591) Homepage Journal

            Peter Thiel said about Trump, "The media takes Trump literally but not seriously. His supporters take him seriously, but not literally."

            But then they marched on the capitol, and tried to hang Mike Pence, so we know Peter Thiel is a dumbfuck

          • Yep, Roe V Wade, success, Immigration was also pretty successful. Especially that initial muslim ban. The red's were lapping it up. But mainly, roe v wade. The red's have been dreaming of a packed supreme court forever, and with mitch & don, they got it. True irony too, as I'd be stunned if don didn't pay for many abortions much like herschel. But I hope this is my last post on any trump related stuff. I am convinced the guy would shrivel like a pee pee in cold water if the media (and people but here I
      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Dread_ed ( 260158 )

        "It is up to the American people to decide whether they want a liar as their president."

        It is up to the American people to decide WHICH liar they want as their president. We really don't get a choice for one that is not.

        Being supporter of the Electorate party, I feel this is necessary to point out.

        • by quall ( 1441799 )

          You think he's lying? How cute. Lying implies that he knows what he's talking about. He says ignorant things because he's a moron, and not because he's lying.

          Then again, the people crying about the need to fact-check Trump, are the same idiots who also need memes and jokes fact-checked for them.

      • Because it is not Facebook's job to select the next president or to interfere in elections.

        Then Facebook should simply ban all politicians. But they don't, they're providing them a platform.

        If Trump lies on Facebook, it is real news because a presidential candidate publically spreading lies is newsworthy.

        When Trump lies on facebook, it's real news that he lied, but his lies themselves are still lies.

        It is up to the American people to decide whether they want a liar as their president.

        The American people cle

        • Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)

          Facebook's lawyers went to great lengths to insist that they are not a news organisation. So Facebook can't claim the newsworthy-ness defence. They're just broadcasting lies. Pure & simple. They do it to make money so they're profiteering from lies. Remember how rich & powerful the Nazi propaganda machine got in the 1930s & 40s? BTW, it probably won't be Trump this time around as it looks like Rupert Murdoch has lost interest in supporting him & is more than likely on the lookout for the nex
        • Given the low percentage of American's vote, what the American people want is pretty immaterial due to turnout.
    • It's not that. It's to protect their fact checkers. Exposing workers to GQP rants all day most likely comes under the cruel & unusual punishment definition of the UN Convention for Human Rights. Let's face it, the only reason Facebook banned him in the first place was because they were afraid of criminal prosecution after Jan 6. They think they've waited long enough for things to cool down a little & now they want to start making all that lovely advertising money fuelled by sexism, racism, xenophobi
    • by jmccue ( 834797 )
      You realize, people who's whole life is centered around facebook and not too different. You get what you sow as they say.
    • Because he is one of them. Because looking from the top, the show that is put on for the proles makes no difference for those running the show. Because once you put any one of them away, you have to face a future where anyone can be put away.
  • Just politicians? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:11AM (#63065135)
    I really don't have a problem a platform being a medium for communications and not fact-checking things. I don't expect CmdrTaco and CowboyNeal to fact-check my slashdot posts. Let the press fact-check politicians' statements.

    But, I can't quite see why twitter should fact-check messages from everybody except politicians.

    • by stephanruby ( 542433 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:44AM (#63065191)

      I don't expect CmdrTaco and CowboyNeal to fact-check my slashdot posts.

      That's because on Slashdot, other users with mod points will fact-check your posts and decide if you're trolling or not.

      • Are you kidding? a good trolling gets marked up around here.

        How much do you think the FTX scooby snacks were dolled out to the press to keep them rich with worthless beads? I am under the impression, we are exiting a information discontinuity from a period for the last 2 decades rivaling yellow journalism has been exposed and it going to be long sprial down for MSM. The typical talking heads will be telling us we told you so.
        • Are you kidding? a good trolling gets marked up around here.

          I was responding to someone's post.

          Basically, that person was saying that there was no censorship on Slashdot.

          And there is.

        • Are you kidding? a good trolling gets marked up around here.

          They really don't. There are some trolls and idiots with modpoints but it is a system that is largely correcting. You may get the impression that trolling gets marked up a lot here based on when you read Slashdot. For a new story there can be a significant difference in what it looks like on the first page between being posted at a time and reading time, e.g. It's sunday morning now, I expect new stories to be chock full of upmodded garbage posts especially pro China / pro Russia. However, revisit the story

          • That's generally been my experience as well; there is a window where moderation can influence the discussion (likely the Russian/Chinese strategy), but moderation eventually normalizes out most of the posts. The problem is you lose insightful discussion because the conversation is shifted to the crazy points.

      • You might base your moderation on fact (or rather, what you personally think is fact) but that is most certainly not true of many others.
  • by Chromium_One ( 126329 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:17AM (#63065145)

    "political speech is ineligible for fact-checking. This includes the words a politician says as well as photo, video, or other content that is clearly labeled as created by the politician or their campaign."

    Or, tell us how much you approve of some of their lies without telling us how much you approve of some of their lies.
    In short, go fuck yourselves there, FB.

  • by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:25AM (#63065157)
    The public is done with Donald trump. His base will still hand him the nomination but he's unelectable in the general election. Meanwhile the Republican party is going to spend the next two years undermining him in a desperate bid to get DeSantis in the power in the hopes that he can pull off another January 6th only this time successfully.

    The Republican party is at a crossroads. Or rather they were at a crossroads. They had to choose between democracy and fascism and they picked fascism rather than give up even a smidge of money and power.

    The baby boomers are pretty comfortable from decades of a strong economy when they were in their prime so they're willing to give up democracy but Gen X, M and Z ain't. The Republican Party needed to sweep the midterms and consolidate their power so they could put a person in office in 2024 and declare them president for life like chairman Xi. They've missed that opportunity.

    Now the old generation will fade out and the younger generations who own virtually no property will demand a new deal that the Republicans are unwilling and unable to provide.

    With Trump back on Twitter he'll be able to stand in his cycle despite the Republican party trying to quash him. He'll either end up with the nomination and losing the general or he'll lose the nomination and run third party splitting the vote.

    Either way the Republican party is done for. Their control of the Supreme Court and the partisan nature of the Court will continue to exert an effect on our politics for another 10 or 20 years until we pack the courts and or impeach some of the more corrupt justices but overall they're just going to fade away like their voters.
    • His base will still hand him the nomination but he's unelectable in the general election.

      I heard that said about a million times back in 2016.

      • I heard that said about a million times back in 2016.

        I remind you he lost the popular vote in 2016, and since then has had more votes *against* him than any other sitting president.

        Make no mistake, the only reason Trump won in 2016 was due to democratic party incompetence and a game very well played by *team* Trump, not aided by the man himself.

        • I think the 2016 election had more to do with Hillary being a completely unlikable human. She was so out of touch she seemed like an alien trying to act like a human.
        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by quonset ( 4839537 )

          Make no mistake, the only reason Trump won in 2016 was due to democratic party incompetence and a game very well played by *team* Trump, not aided by the man himself.

          It had more to do with Republicans [theguardian.com] gerrymandering [propublica.org] districts [texasmonthly.com]. If districts were created based on reality, Hillary would have won.

          It should also be noted that after the midterm elections, Republicans are now howling that the voting age should be increased to 21 [yahoo.com]. Why? Because Gen Z voted in droves for Democrats. They also want to restrict, if not

    • The public is done with Donald trump. His base will still hand him the nomination but he's unelectable in the general election.

      In an European Union state, Trump would start his own political party.

      It seems, that his party would receive enough percent of votes to pass the minimal threshold. In EU it is usually 5%.

      Everyone could vote for what they want and be represented by at least one chair in the government.

      • In an European Union state

        This has nothing to do with an EU state and everything to do with the kind of election system present in various countries. In countries with First-Past-The-Post electoral systems, two party systems become a dominant stable configuration and it is virtually impossible to change this. Your "EU" comment is only relevant now since the only country which did have a FPTP system left the EU and that country has had 70 years of Labour/Conservative rule with the Liberal Democrats (and even more minor parties), bein

      • He still might do that in the US, at least as a threat to the Republican party. He would end up getting about 20-25% of the vote, but would prevent the Republican candidate from getting 50%. See Ross Perot.

    • by NotEmmanuelGoldstein ( 6423622 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @05:18AM (#63065425)

      ... going to fade away like their voters.

      Heard of a little thing called "January 6th"? That's how committed Republican-party voters are: They will not "fade away", the ending of Republican-party greed and authoritarianism, will be ugly.

    • by lsllll ( 830002 )
      Z can't get its head out of its ass if it tried to. M could with some lube. It's the same old adage. With age comes wisdom. Gen Z thinks it can solve all the world's problems because, like every other young person, it's got tunnel vision. It doesn't see more than 2 feet in front of its feet. There's a reason why, even back 250 years ago, the founding fathers required the president to be at least 35 years old.
    • I will say I'm a left wing partisan and I'd love it if that were true, but I find that assessment implausible.

  • ummmm (Score:5, Insightful)

    by peterww ( 6558522 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:25AM (#63065159)

    "It is not our role to intervene when politicians speak,"

    so if Hitler is posting conspiracies about Jews and following that up by saying all true patriots must defend the Fatherland, rise up and kill the heathens, Facebook has nothing to say about that.

    at this point Facebook is more a risk to our democracy than the crazy politicians

    • "It is not our role to intervene when politicians speak,"

      I'll be waiting to see how Facebook responds when Trump inevitably spouts, um... -- misinformation -- about Facebook.

      And I do mean inevitably. He likes to rant about everyone and everything and almost everything he says is a lie, misleading or simply wrong. (If you think I'm trolling, the Washington Post has a *long* list of his 30,573 false/misleading claims over *just* 4 years [washingtonpost.com] -- as someone else has noted. That averages out to 21 a day, or 1.3 every single waking hour, assuming 8h of sleep.)

      • Have you actually looked through that database? If Trump would say America is the greatest nation, they'd mark this as a lie. For example, Trump's claim to have received 75 million votes, the most received by a sitting president... yes, it was in fact 73.6, the highest received by a sitting president. Adding 1.4 doesn't change a thing as Biden received 81 million. Then consider the comment he had concerning his wife.

        âoeOur first lady has been a woman of great grace and beauty and dignity. And so popula

        • The deemed this a lie, citing a CNN poll as evidence. Really? This is a worthy data point, that a man says his wife is popular?

          Given that she's probably his handler? Yeah, it's relevant.

    • Well, to be fair, "big media" also peddles fake news all day long, the only difference is that the internet is much cheaper to distribute and disseminate lies that suit a certain world view. That FB will not call out BS going forwards for any of the politicians just places then in the good company of anyone else on the internet, and those with a large enough base to fund traditional media.
  • by trawg ( 308495 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @01:48AM (#63065193) Homepage

    Bullshit. This is because it will generate tons of 'engagement',which they'll use to boost flagging numbers to get people to up ad spend.

    Every gutless media company will find an excuse to bring this dipshit back because he brings the clicks like nothing else. Damn the consequences.

    • Every gutless media company will find an excuse to bring this dipshit back because he brings the clicks like nothing else. Damn the consequences.

      I don't think Twitter would have ever brought Twitler back without Elno, or someone else like him.

    • Bullshit. This is because it will generate tons of 'engagement',which they'll use to boost flagging numbers to get people to up ad spend.

      Every gutless media company will find an excuse to bring this dipshit back because he brings the clicks like nothing else. Damn the consequences.

      It's not about the clicks, it's about the backlash.

      There's a degree of controversy that's is just enough to bring clicks, and the bean counters at FB love that. The problem with the true "culture warriors" like Trump is the hostility creates a negative user experience and people eventually start disengaging from the platform.

      The reason they don't factcheck Trump now that he's a "politician" is that Republican politicians have been making more and more noise about screwing with Social Media companies to stop

  • Facebook's Fact-checkers Will Stop Checking Trump ...

    (a) It'll cut down on the medical expenses if their heads don't keep exploding.

    (b) Based on past performance, it's easier to simply assume that everything he says is suspect.
    [ There were at least 20 misstatements (putting it kindly) in his announcement to run again for President. ]

  • We lick certain brown stains from politicians, equally, but favoring the worst one. And, politicians are allowed to lie. To lie is good. Let's all lie. Facebook should be banned from the internets. They are damaging humanities progress in increasing amount of ways. Way too many already.
  • Will the fact the fact check notice is disappearing from Trump's one eyed version of reality, will it give his fence sitting followers the false impression that what he's saying is now factual...??? That would be worse than just leaving the fact check banner below every politicians musings.
  • my 2052 pres bid (Score:4, Interesting)

    by slothman32 ( 629113 ) * <pjohnjackson&gmail,com> on Sunday November 20, 2022 @03:53AM (#63065331) Homepage Journal

    Since they don't fact check candidates for president I am going to run in 2052.
    Now I can lie all I want and it can't be removed.
    Of course I don't use FB but I wonder if that would be a good way to lie.
    Or does it have to be a candidate the owner likes?

  • The fact that they're running for office is, in and of itself, an indicator of lying.

  • Playing the victimc (Score:3, Interesting)

    by NotEmmanuelGoldstein ( 6423622 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @05:10AM (#63065417)

    ... Trump announced a 2024 presidential bid ...

    With whom? Even his ex-lawyer reckons Trump knows campaigning again is a no-win move. The Republican party doesn't want Trump, they're throwing their money at someone who doesn't have the charisma of Trump or the 'true faith' of Reagan: A wanna-be fuhrer will turn the US election into a dumpster fire when the Republican but true-faithless are ignored and forgotten.

    I think Trump will be 'playing the victim' according to a plan: Declare his nomination, get millions of political donations, spend a few (dozen) million campaigning, blame the Republican party for his poor poll results, withdraw acrimoniously, laugh all the way to the bank.

    • Laugh all the way to the bank or cry all the way to jail?

      Its the Republican party that is slow walking the investigations and impeding them. If they pull the stops, there are enough indictments to lock the Agent Orange for several decades.

  • by chas.williams ( 6256556 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @06:57AM (#63065517)
    Once someone announces they are running for office, they should receive an immediate ban. Then you don't need to worry about fact-checking candidates.
  • by divide overflow ( 599608 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @07:36AM (#63065563)
    Everyone should be fact checked, always, without exception.
    Take nothing for granted.
    Especially from those seeking positions of power.
  • If anything, politicians should be fact checked the most. If you want to run a campaign on lies, that's fine, but it's in the public interest to know who is making up nonsense and who is not. If one side has a fact checking problem, it's not the fact checking that's the problem. But obviously no one is expecting Facebook to act responsibly.

  • to counter the rise of populistic or even dictatorian regimes. Only censor the lower subjects. Way to go, Mark.
  • by Impy the Impiuos Imp ( 442658 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @11:15AM (#63065905) Journal

    There will be lots of hot air in this thread, as many have been programmed by to believe statements by opposition should be shut down on principle, yet this decision aligns with concepts of the First Amendment, where political speech is the most protected of all, even knowing deliberate lies.

    Why? Because government should never be the arbiter of truth spoken against it.

    "But it's speech decisions by free people who own the corporation!

    Nice of you to jump on board Citizens United, after whining about it for two decades. Yes, corporations don't have speech rights, the owners do, who carry it with them wherever they go, including taking advantage of congressional creations like "corporations", who may not strip the First Amendment as the price of entry.

    Did you know Musk was made to go answer questions before Congress about hands off for political speech, the kind of government "investigation" into speech that has long been rejected by courts as intimidating speech, and thus violating the First Amendment?

  • by DewDude ( 537374 ) on Sunday November 20, 2022 @05:40PM (#63066669) Homepage

    One of the now former cornerstones of our Democracy is that the people we elect to represent us are supposed to be us. They're not supposed to be treated better than us, they're not supposed to be above the law. But time and time again...and they're absolutely not supposed to threaten retaliation when people treat them the same as everyone else. But despite the constitutional violation of doing so, companies are now pressured to put politicians above the people; which only validates the idea that they are above the law when it comes to the law.

    It's absolutely disgusting they're willing to allow lies and hate to be spread simply because one is a politician. This is not even satire anymore. What's next? Everything they say automatically becomes law? If I hadn't already stopped using Facebook; then this would be the last straw.

    I don't give a fuck who you are or what office you hold; you DO NOT deserve special treatment. We're a democracy, not a goddamn dictatorship. If I can't get away with it, they shouldn't get away with it.

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