1. United States
2. S.C.
3. Letter

Allowing Billionaires to own our social media, in a time where people increasingly get their news from various social media platforms, is a threat to democracy. Yesterday, the No Kings movement’s account went dark for several hours while protests focused on increasing early voter turnout were underway, sparking censorship fears. The coalition leaders behind nationwide pro-democracy protests that have drawn millions of Americans to the streets in recent years were frustrated when its Instagram account was temporarily shut down during its latest demonstration on Saturday. Meta apologized on Saturday and blamed the account’s temporary suspension on an automated action that’s triggered “when accounts post, share or comment at very high frequencies”. “Unfortunately, that automated action was clearly taken in error,” Meta spokesperson Andy Stone, wrote on X. “Everything is now working as it should and we sincerely apologize.” “We have regained access to our accounts, but Meta still owes us an explanation,” the No Kings Coalition posted on their Instagram page, on Sunday. “Restricting communications about voting in the middle of an election is unacceptable.” Organizers remained skeptical about Meta’s explanation that high-frequency posting triggered an automated response, and said members “posted only a handful of times and livestreamed to thousands”. Senator Bernie Sanders also expressed concerns on Sunday, on X, saying that “billionaire ownership of the media” had resulted in the suspension of the No Kings account. We must fight to put laws in place to insure owners of these social media companies make a good faith effort to stop political disinformation and that they are not allowed to block platforms based on their personal political views. Musk and Zuckerberg have spent the last decade swaying elections by influencing what we can and can not see on their platforms. This must be dealt with effective legislation!