from the up-is-down,-day-is-night dept
I’ve a easy query for Senator Ted Cruz: Who was president in 2018? How about 2020?
I ask as a result of Cruz simply launched a “bombshell” report claiming that the Biden administration “transformed” CISA into “the Thought Police.” There’s only one tiny downside with this narrative: Cruz’s personal report reveals that every part he’s mad about began beneath Donald Trump, beneath whose management CISA was created. And in addition that Cruz’s researchers assume responding to false info is censorship. Additionally, finding out disinformation is, in some way, censorship.
However, most significantly, apparently Ted Cruz doesn’t appear to know the way time works.
Look, we’ve been via this dance earlier than. The Supreme Courtroom, in a call written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, already examined these actual claims about authorities “censorship” and located them to be bullshit. Barrett’s determination mentions “no proof” at the least 5 occasions and features a devastating footnote explaining how the “proof” was “clearly inaccurate.”
The Fifth Circuit relied on the District Courtroom’s factual findings, a lot of which sadly look like clearly inaccurate. The District Courtroom discovered that the defendants and the platforms had an “environment friendly report-and-censor relationship.” Missouri v. Biden, 680 F. Supp. 3d 630, 715 (WD La. 2023). However a lot of its proof is inapposite. For example, the courtroom says that Twitter arrange a “streamlined course of for censorship requests” after the White Home “bombarded” it with such requests. Ibid., n. 662 (inner citation marks omitted). The document it cites says nothing about “censorship requests.” See App. 639–642. Quite, in response to a White Home official asking Twitter to take away an impersonation account of President Biden’s granddaughter, Twitter instructed the official a few portal that he might use to flag related points. Ibid. This has nothing to do with COVID–19 misinformation. The courtroom additionally discovered that “[a] drastic improve in censorship . . . instantly coincided with Defendants’ public requires censorship and personal calls for for censorship.” 680 F. Supp. 3d, at 715. As to the “requires censorship,” the courtroom’s proof included statements from Members of Congress, who should not events to this swimsuit. Ibid., and n. 658. Among the proof of the “improve in censorship” reveals that Fb labored with the CDC to replace its listing of detachable false claims, however these examples don’t recommend that the company “demand[ed]” that it achieve this. Ibid. Lastly, the courtroom, echoing the plaintiffs’ proposed assertion of information, erroneously acknowledged that Fb agreed to censor content material that didn’t violate its insurance policies. Id., at 714, n. 655. As a substitute, on a number of events, Fb defined that sure content material didn’t qualify for removing beneath its insurance policies however did qualify for different types of moderation.
Cruz and his crew apparently missed all that. Or they learn about it and have determined to misrepresent it. I’m unsure which is worse.
The centerpiece of Cruz’s report is CISA—the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Safety Company. Based on Cruz, this company was created with pure intentions beneath Trump however was then “transformed” by Biden right into a censorship machine.
Cruz’s report repeatedly undermines its personal thesis. He writes:
“Starting in 2018, CISA organized and attended common conferences with trade and authorities officers to push its censorship agenda”
2018, Ted. Who was president then, Ted? Are you aware? I’ll offer you a touch: it wasn’t Joe Biden.
Oh, and bear in mind how Cruz claimed that coping with misinformation wasn’t a part of CISA’s unique plan? Nicely, CISA was created on November 16, 2018. So in the event that they began these “common conferences” in 2018, meaning… they began instantly. Underneath Trump. As a part of the unique plan.
Additionally, Cruz retains calling this a “censorship agenda,” however his personal report reveals that CISA’s position was coordination and data sharing. You already know, the factor they had been explicitly created to do.
The supposed smoking gun in Cruz’s report is one thing referred to as “switchboarding”—the place CISA would move alongside reviews from state election officers to social media firms. Cruz presents this as proof of censorship.
However right here’s what truly occurred: Election officers would flag potential election misinformation to CISA, particularly the place such misinformation would possibly undermine the integrity of the election system (i.e., telling folks to vote within the mistaken place or on the mistaken day). CISA would ahead it to platforms with a transparent disclaimer that this was not a requirement. Platforms would then assessment the content material in opposition to their very own insurance policies.
Each single message CISA despatched included this disclaimer:
The U.S. Division of Homeland Safety (DHS) Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Safety Company (CISA) shouldn’t be the originator of this info. CISA is forwarding this info, unedited, from its originating source-this info has not been originated or generated by CISA. This info can also be shared with regulation enforcement or intelligence businesses.
Within the occasion that CISA follows as much as request additional info, equivalent to a request shouldn’t be a requirement or demand. Responding to this request is voluntary and CISA won’t take any motion, favorable or unfavorable, primarily based on selections about whether or not or not to answer this follow-up request for info.
All through the report, Cruz makes baseless claims that his personal sources instantly contradict. He says CISA “instantly instructed social media firms to reasonable particular content material.” Then, in the exact same paragraph, admits that what truly occurred was CISA forwarding content material with disclaimers, and platforms reviewing it “primarily based on their insurance policies.”
Take the next for instance:
In the course of the 2020 election, CISA directed state and native election officers to report supposed election-related MDM to CISA. CISA would then assessment the reviews and ahead them to social media firms so they might take away the content material. This course of is known as “switchboarding.” As Mr. Scully, who led the CISA crew performing this work, defined, switchboarding “was primarily an [election] official…establish[ing] one thing on social media they deemed to be disinformation geared toward their jurisdiction. They might ahead that to CISA, and CISA would share that with the suitable social media firms.”
The emails under between Scully, the Maryland State Board of Electors, and Twitter illustrate how the switchboarding course of labored. Step One: the Maryland Official emailed Scully a number of tweets relating to mail-in ballots. Step Two: Scully forwarded that e mail to Twitter. Step Three: Twitter instantly responded that it might “escalate” the tweets and later confirmed that the “[t]weets have been actioned for violations of our insurance policies.”
We’ve coated this earlier than, however let’s cowl it once more. Anybody might (and nonetheless can!) flag any content material on Twitter, saying that it violates their insurance policies. It’s true that the majority websites additionally did arrange separate portals to deal with such flags from authorities actors, partly as a result of these would possibly require additional authorized scrutiny.
And, be aware what occurred: Twitter reviewed the content material to see in the event that they violated its insurance policies. They didn’t take them down as a result of the federal government requested it, however as a result of they violated insurance policies.
And we all know, for a truth, that Twitter (and different social media websites) truly rejected the overwhelming majority of such flags. Hell, in Cruz’s personal report he features a quote from a CISA worker, Brian Scully, noting that they knew the businesses would assessment it in opposition to their very own insurance policies:
Based on Scully, CISA knew social media firms would apply their content material moderation insurance policies to “disinformation” if CISA alerted them to it. “The thought was,” he defined, that social media firms “would make [a] determination on the content material that [CISA] ahead[ed] to them primarily based on their insurance policies.” He acknowledged that if the content material had not been delivered to social media firms’ consideration, the platforms wouldn’t have in any other case moderated it.
Additionally, Scully couldn’t probably know that final line is true. As a result of he has no concept what kind of monitoring the businesses would do in any other case or who else would possibly flag the identical info to them. And, simply the truth that Cruz’s report doesn’t quote Scully and solely summarizes that he “acknowledged” such a declare is suspect.
So, I did what Cruz didn’t do for the readers of the report and regarded up Scully’s full deposition to see how that dialog truly went down. And… Cruz is completely misrepresenting what was mentioned. Scully notes that they solely shared info for the businesses to resolve what to do with it.
Q. Switchboard work, what does that imply?
A. It was primarily an audit official to establish one thing on social media they deemed to be disinformation geared toward their jurisdiction. They might ahead that to CISA and CISA would share that with the suitable social media firms.
Q. And what was the aim of sharing it with social media firms?
A. Principally for informational consciousness functions, simply to be sure that the social media firms had been conscious of potential disinformation.
Q. Was there an understanding that if the social media platforms had been conscious of disinformation that they could apply their content material moderation insurance policies to it?
A. Sure. So the concept was that they’d make determination on the content material that was forwarded to them primarily based on their insurance policies.
Q. Whereas, if it hadn’t been delivered to their consideration then they clearly wouldn’t have moderated it as content material; right?
A. Yeah, I suppose that’s true, so far as I’m conscious of it.
Be aware the complete consistency all alongside right here. At no level was the concept right here about censorship. It was all the time flagging content material for the platforms to resolve what to do with it (and later reviews confirmed they took no motion on over 60% of the URLs reported).
There’s additionally a delicate, however essential, nuance in that ultimate query. The query was not about whether or not or not the moderation would or wouldn’t have occurred if CISA referred to as it out. It simply says “if it hadn’t been delivered to their consideration.”
Cruz’s crew pretends Scully was solely requested about whether or not or not motion would have occurred if CISA flagged it. Cruz’s report pretends CISA “acknowledges” right here that the takedown would solely happen due to CISA, which isn’t what Scully truly mentioned.
It’s lastly midway via the report that Cruz tries to tie all this to the Biden administration, by suggesting that there was a change beneath Biden. However, as per standard, he takes issues out of context and presenting them in probably the most deceptive mild attainable.
Cruz claims that CISA ramped up its “speech policing” efforts beneath Biden, whereas his personal report reveals they really stopped switchboarding in 2022:
CISA instructed the Committee that it stopped switchboarding in 2022. Brian Scully testified that former CISA Director Jen Easterly apparently made the choice to forgo this work… as Scully defined, switchboarding “was not a task [CISA] essentially needed to play” any longer “as a result of it is extremely useful resource intensive.”
So let me get this straight, Ted: Biden supposedly ramped up the censorship operation… by shutting it down? That’s some 4D chess there.
Essentially the most absurd a part of Cruz’s report comes when he tries to elucidate how CISA supposedly “groomed” non-public organizations to proceed the work after they stopped switchboarding. His smoking gun? CISA launched two organizations doing related work in order that they wouldn’t duplicate efforts.
That’s it. That’s the conspiracy.
“There was a degree the place one of many platforms was involved about an excessive amount of type of duplicate reporting coming in, and so we did have some conversations with EIP and CIS on how you can type of higher handle that exercise to ensure we weren’t overwhelming the platforms.” Scully additional testified that CISA “facilitated some conferences between Stanford of us, the Heart for Web Safety, and election officers, the place they’d discussions about how they’d work collectively.”
That doesn’t sound like “grooming” businesses for censorship. It appears like CISA seeing that a number of non-public teams had been duplicating efforts and residing as much as its coordination and data sharing mandate by… connecting them, so they might coordinate and share info.
Past not understanding linear time, it’s not clear if Ted Cruz understands what phrases imply.
All through this trainwreck of a report, Cruz persistently conflates “monitoring and responding to misinformation” with “censorship.” He quotes the Election Integrity Partnership saying that no authorities company has the express mandate “to watch and proper” election misinformation, then claims this proves they didn’t have authority “to censor.”
However “monitor and proper” shouldn’t be “censor.” Correcting misinformation means responding to it with correct info—you already know, counter-speech. The factor the First Modification truly protects.
The complete report boils right down to this: Ted Cruz thinks that finding out misinformation, sharing details about it, and responding to it with factual corrections constitutes “censorship.” By that logic, each fact-checker, each information group, and each one that’s ever mentioned “truly, that’s not true” is engaged in censorship.
Like right here, Ted, I’m correcting your bullshit. Is that censorship?
Once more, I’ve to remind you, as a result of it’s vital, anybody can flag any content material for any social media web site, and that web site will assessment it in opposition to its insurance policies, and in the event that they discover it violates these insurance policies, they may take motion.
And but, Ted Cruz pretends that’s censorship:
The Committee discovered proof indicating that CISA instantly instructed social media firms to reasonable particular content material. For example, in a single doc the Committee reviewed, a lawyer employed by Twitter reviewed Twitter’s communications with authorities entities and summarized the situations by which CISA had both raised its “direct issues” with Twitter or forwarded an e mail from an election official about “inaccurate” info on the platform, and Twitter “took motion.”125 Paperwork like these strengthened the Committee’s suspicion that CISA was hiding the true extent of its relationship with social media firms and its content material moderation stress marketing campaign.
The primary sentence claims that CISA “instantly instructed social media firms to reasonable particular content material.” So you’ll assume there could be proof of that. As a substitute, what the remainder of the paragraph reveals is, as described above (and publicly all through the previous 5 years) CISA would move alongside content material—with a transparent assertion that it wasn’t from CISA and it wasn’t a requirement—and platforms would independently assessment it to see if it violated their insurance policies. And if it did violate the insurance policies, they’d take motion.
Okay, however what about CISA work on “mis- and disinformation” via its “MDM subcommittee.” Once more, it’s not clear Ted Cruz understands English. As a result of the report notes that this was a key advice of that group:
“[R]apidly reply—via transparency and communication—to emergent informational threats to important infrastructure. . . . These response efforts could be actor-agnostic, however particular consideration ought to be paid to countering overseas threats.”
Sure. Quickly responding, via transparency and communication.
Does that sound like “censorship” to anybody apart from Ted Cruz?
Up is down, black is white, day is evening. Ted Cruz is both a mendacious liar. Or an fool.
Let’s be clear about what truly occurred right here. CISA was created by Donald Trump in November 2018. Based on Cruz’s personal timeline, it instantly started the work he’s now calling “censorship” or “speech policing” although anybody trying on the particulars would notice it was no such factor. That work continued via 2020—nonetheless beneath Trump. Biden took workplace, after which CISA scaled again these actions in 2022.
So Cruz is actually blaming Biden for issues that didn’t occur, however the issues he misinterpreted are issues that began beneath Trump and had been decreased beneath Biden.
This isn’t simply mistaken—it’s traditionally illiterate and spectacularly, embarrassingly mistaken. And it’s a part of a broader sample of MAGA lies about authorities “censorship” that the Supreme Courtroom has already debunked.
The objective right here isn’t accuracy. It’s making a false narrative to justify precise retaliation in opposition to platforms that don’t toe the road. Cruz is aware of that most individuals received’t learn the precise paperwork or examine his timeline. They’ll simply see “Biden censorship” within the headlines and settle for it as truth.
However the paperwork don’t lie, even when Ted Cruz does. His personal report proves that every part he’s (misleadingly) mad about began beneath Trump, operated beneath the authorized authorities Trump granted, weren’t truly about speech policing, and had been scaled again beneath Biden.
Ted Cruz both doesn’t know who was president when, or he’s relying on you not figuring out. He additionally both doesn’t know what precise censorship is, or he’s… relying on you not figuring out. Both manner, it’s a reasonably damning indictment of a sitting U.S. Senator.
The complete 22-page report boils right down to this: “How dare the company Donald Trump created to coordinate info sharing… coordinate info sharing.”
And sadly, as a result of Cruz put “censorship” and “Biden” in the identical sentence, many individuals will now deal with this nonsense as gospel fact.
Filed Underneath: brian scully, cisa, content material moderation, donald trump, election integrity partnership, info sharing, joe biden, ted cruz
