The Daily Signal - Zuckerberg Admits Censorship, Israel Rescues Hostage, Ukraine Asks for More US Support | August 27

Starting point is 00:00:00 It's week three of Canadian tires early Black Friday sales. These prices won't go lower this year. Maybe too long. Freezing. Save up to 50% November 20th to 27th. Conditions apply, details online. Mark Zuckerberg admits that Facebook censored content related to COVID-19. I'm Elizabeth Mitchell, and this is the Daily Signal Top News for Tuesday, August 27th.

Starting point is 00:00:31 Meta and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a letter to the House Subcommittee on the Weaponization of Government on Monday, that the Biden-Harris administration pressured Facebook to censor content on its platform related to the COVID-19 pandemic and other major stories. The Daily Signal's Bradley-Devlin covered this story. Bradley, what did Zuckerberg say in the letter? Yeah, Zuckerberg said, quote, In 2021, senior officials from the Biden administration, including the White House, repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content,

Starting point is 00:01:03 including humor and satire and expressed a lot of frustration with our teams, when we didn't agree. Nevertheless, Zuckerberg did admit that Facebook had some culpability in the censorship that took place on the platform saying, ultimately, it was our decision whether or not to take the content down, and we own our decisions, including COVID-19 related changes we made to our enforcement in the wake of this pressure. I believe the government pressure was wrong, and I regret that we are not more outspoken about it. Interesting. How did the Biden administration react? Yeah, in a statement to Fox News, a White House spokesperson seemed to double down on the Biden administration's censorship efforts. They said, quote, when confronted with a deadly pandemic,

Starting point is 00:01:42 this administration encouraged responsible actions to protect our public health and safety. Our position has been clear and consistent. We believe tech companies and other private actors should take into account the effects of their actions have on the American people while making independent choices about the information they present. What was the context surrounding the meta-CEO making this admission? Yeah, this comes as a federal judge ruled on Tuesday that RFK, Jr. can sue the Biden administration over alleged social media censorship of his children's health defense charity, which questions the safety of vaccines. Obviously, that was a big issue

Starting point is 00:02:17 with RFK Jr.'s campaign. And now RFK Jr. has come to endorse President Donald Trump and kind of a weird marriage of their two populist movements, even though Donald Trump was behind Operation Warp Speed, and RFK Jr. has been questioning not only a question the efficacy of the COVID vaccine, but vaccines more generally. this moves forward and impacts other court cases in the future remains to be seen, but we did see that the Supreme Court threw out a case about social media censorship previously this summer. So whether or not questions like that reemerge in front of the Supreme Court or other federal courts, we'll be keeping an eye on that for sure.

Starting point is 00:02:57 What can be done to prevent the White House from pressuring social media companies to censor their content in the future? I think the number one thing that can be done is, for social media companies to just say no, as the old Nancy Reagan phrase go, don't give into their demands to censor this type of content, right? Zuckerberg admitted this in the letter saying, we ultimately had the final say here, and we decided to go along with what the Biden-Harris administration wanted us to do. Now, that in and of itself brings up serious constitutional questions, right?

Starting point is 00:03:33 and the government pressure private entities into accomplishing goals that it would otherwise not be able to achieve because of the U.S. Constitution, the Supreme Court has said in the past, no, the government cannot use these private actors to do so. And so maybe revisiting that case, it would be important for the Supreme Court to do in the future as it tries to sever the ties between the government establishment in Washington and Big Tech in Silicon Valley. Absolutely. Thanks for your reporting. The Heritage Foundation held an event yesterday covering the Secret Services performance before, during, and after the July 13th attempted Trump assassination. The Daily Signal's Tyler O'Neill covered the panel. Tyler, who was on the panel and what were their predictions for the Secret Service going forward? Yeah, it was a really, really shocking and eye-opening panel. You had former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino and then two others, Eric Prince, who is a former Navy SEAL and founder of Blackwater. And then Ben Schaefer, who's a Washington Regional SWAT operator who also assisted in security on July 13th there in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Starting point is 00:04:50 And we have five Republican members of Congress asking them really important questions. What a phenomenal group and what did their predictions reveal? It was really surprising. So like Dan Bongino got up there and they asked, rep Eli Crane asked him if the Secret Service is in a better spot today after Director Kimberly Cheel resigned and Director Ronald Roe replaced her. And he said, no, it's worse. And he predicted that something else will likely happen. And he suggested, you know, we may see another attempt on a Secret Service protectee, perhaps even another attempt on former President Trump. Interesting.

Starting point is 00:05:34 The Secret Service has so far provided minimal answers on the details of the assassination attempt since it happened. Did the panelists shine any light on what enabled a former president to be shot? Yeah, yeah, they shined all sorts of light on it. Schaefer in particular, the really shocking thing, Mills asked Schaefer a series of questions. And it was showing that Secret Service refused help that local law enforcement offered. They refused a radio. They refused a surveillance drone. They didn't show up for the morning briefing to ensure the last minute planning could be accounted for.

Starting point is 00:06:10 And they also did not access the water tower that had the highest vantage point. And the most shocking thing to me from this event was when Eric Prince said that 100,000, 140 yards is point blank range for a sniper. And he said, thank God that it was a 20-year-old who aimed for a headshot because if he had aimed center mass, which is what you're supposed to do if you were serious, President Trump would not have survived. He also said that ISIS or a Hezbollah team or any sort of foreign terrorist group would probably have succeeded given the low level of security that Secret Service provided that day. Wow. So you would say from what you learned at the panel, it's safe to say that Trump did not have sufficient security protection at the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Yeah, I would say that is the opinion of the experts who testified. And Dan Bongino in particular suggested that Secret Service intentionally understaffed Trump's protective detail because more personnel would have made him look more presidential and more like a big shot. It seems, he said, that they're more concerned about optics than they are about saving the life of somebody under their protection.

Starting point is 00:07:31 Wow. Well, thank you so much for covering this. Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for having me. Israel announced today that it rescued a 52-year-old hostage from an underground tunnel in southern Gaza. The Israeli hostage was on the job as a factory security guard near Gaza when militants kidnapped him on October 7th when Hamas first attacked Israel. Israeli troops had crept through tunnels for days, wary of an ambush from Hamas terrorist, when it discovered the man. He is the eighth hostage to be rescued alive in Gaza by the Israeli military. The man was taken to a hospital in Israel where he reunited with his Bedouin Arab family.

Starting point is 00:08:09 He is a Muslim citizen of Israel and the father of 11 children. Ukraine deployed U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets against Russia on Monday and Tuesday, but the country said it needs more aid in its must. military pushback. Ukraine used the jets to intercept drones and missiles during two days of attacks from Russia that killed at least four people. Russia's defense ministry said it targeted airfield infrastructure facilities with long-range precision weapons. Ukrainian president Volodymy Zelenskyy thanked Ukraine's partners for providing the country with the F-16s but said, of course, this is not enough. We don't have many of them and we still need to train pilots.

Starting point is 00:08:49 China plans to restrict exports of a key mineral that the U.S. needs to make weapons. But energy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation that an American mining company called Perpetua Resources could be reducing America's reliance on foreign suppliers like China, but it has been stuck navigating American government red tape for years. On August 15th, the Chinese government announced it will restrict exports of antimony, a mineral critical for the production of weapons and equipment like 90s. vision goggles and bullets. Perpetua Resources has struggled with the slow permitting process as it has tried to develop

Starting point is 00:09:27 a mine in Valley County, Idaho. The company told the Daily Caller News Foundation it started the National Environmental Policy Act permitting process in 2016 and has struggled to get the necessary approvals and permits for eight years. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of the Daily Signal podcast. I hope you enjoyed the top news of the day. Be sure to tune in tomorrow morning. for our interview edition where Virginia Allen will sit down with Heritage Visiting Fellow Brian Kavanaugh.

Starting point is 00:09:59 They will be discussing the one-year anniversary of the Wildfires in Hawaii. Please make sure to subscribe to The Daily Signal wherever you get your podcast and help us reach a five-star rating by leaving a review. We would love to read your feedback. Thank you so much for listening. Have a great night and we'll back with you in the morning. The Daily Signal podcast is made possible because of listeners like you. Executive producers are Rob Lewy and Katrina Trinko. Hosts are Virginia Allen, Brian Gottstein, Tyler O'Neill, Mary Margaret O'Lohan, and Elizabeth Mitchell.

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The Daily Signal - Zuckerberg Admits Censorship, Israel Rescues Hostage, Ukraine Asks for More US Support | August 27

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