The Free Internet Project

Project Safeguarding Elections

Summary: Mounting Allegations Facebook, Zuckerberg Have Political Bias and Favoritism for Trump and conservatives in content moderation

In the past week, more allegations surfaced that Facebook executives have been intervening in questionable ways in the company's content moderation procedure that show favoritism to Donald Trump, Breitbart, and other conservatives. These news reports cut against the narrative that Facebook has an "anti-conservative bias." For example, according to some allegations, Facebook executives didn't want to enforce existing community standards or change the community standards in a way that would flag conservatives for violations, even when the content moderators found violations by conservatives.  Below is a summary of the main allegations that Facebook has been politically biased in favor of Trump and conservatives.  This page will be updated if more allegations are reported.

Ben Smith, How Pro-Trump Forces Work the Refs in Silicon Valley, N.Y. Times (Aug. 9, 2020): "Since then, Facebook has sought to ingratiate itself to the Trump administration, while taking a harder line on Covid-19 misinformation. As the president’s backers post wild claims on the social network, the company offers the equivalent of wrist slaps — a complex fact-checking system that avoids drawing the company directly into the political fray. It hasn’t worked: The fact-checking subcontractors are harried umpires, an easy target for Trump supporters’ ire....In fact, two people close to the Facebook fact-checking process told me, the vast bulk of the posts getting tagged for being fully or partly false come from the right. That’s not bias. It’s because sites like The Gateway Pundit are full of falsehoods, and because the president says false things a lot."

Olivia Solon, Sensitive to claims of bias, Facebook relaxed misinformation rules for conservative pages, NBC News (Aug. 7, 2020, 2:31 PM): "The list and descriptions of the escalations, leaked to NBC News, showed that Facebook employees in the misinformation escalations team, with direct oversight from company leadership, deleted strikes during the review process that were issued to some conservative partners for posting misinformation over the last six months. The discussions of the reviews showed that Facebook employees were worried that complaints about Facebook's fact-checking could go public and fuel allegations that the social network was biased against conservatives. The removal of the strikes has furthered concerns from some current and former employees that the company routinely relaxes its rules for conservative pages over fears about accusations of bias."

Craig Silverman, Facebook Fired an Employee Who Collected Evidence of Right-Wing Page Getting Preferential Treatment, Buzzfeed (Aug. 6, 2020, 4:13 PM): "[S]ome of Facebook’s own employees gathered evidence they say shows Breitbart — along with other right-wing outlets and figures including Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, Trump supporters Diamond and Silk, and conservative video production nonprofit Prager University — has received special treatment that helped it avoid running afoul of company policy. They see it as part of a pattern of preferential treatment for right-wing publishers and pages, many of which have alleged that the social network is biased against conservatives." Further: "Individuals that spoke out about the apparent special treatment of right-wing pages have also faced consequences. In one case, a senior Facebook engineer collected multiple instances of conservative figures receiving unique help from Facebook employees, including those on the policy team, to remove fact-checks on their content. His July post was removed because it violated the company’s 'respectful communication policy.'”

Ryan Mac, Instagram Displayed Negative Related Hashtags for Biden, but Hid them for Trump, Buzzfeed (Aug. 5, 2020, 12:17 PM): "For at least the last two months, a key Instagram feature, which algorithmically pushes users toward supposedly related content, has been treating hashtags associated with President Donald Trump and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in very different ways. Searches for Biden also return a variety of pro-Trump messages, while searches for Trump-related topics only returned the specific hashtags, like #MAGA or #Trump — which means searches for Biden-related hashtags also return counter-messaging, while those for Trump do not."

Ryan Mac & Craig Silverman, "Hurting People at Scale": Facebook's Employees Reckon with the Social Network They've Built, Buzzfeed (July 23, 2020, 12:59 PM): Yaël Eisenstat, Facebook's former election ads integrity lead "said the company’s policy team in Washington, DC, led by Joel Kaplan, sought to unduly influence decisions made by her team, and the company’s recent failure to take appropriate action on posts from President Trump shows employees are right to be upset and concerned."

Elizabeth Dwoskin, Craig Timberg, & Tony Romm, Zuckerberg once wanted to sanction Trump. Then Facebook wrote rules that accommodated him., Wash. Post (June 28, 2020, 6:25 PM): "But that started to change in 2015, as Trump’s candidacy picked up speed. In December of that year, he posted a video in which he said he wanted to ban all Muslims from entering the United States. The video went viral on Facebook and was an early indication of the tone of his candidacy....Ultimately, Zuckerberg was talked out of his desire to remove the post in part by Kaplan, according to the people. Instead, the executives created an allowance that newsworthy political discourse would be taken into account when making decisions about whether posts violated community guidelines....In spring of 2016, Zuckerberg was also talked out of his desire to write a post specifically condemning Trump for his calls to build a wall between the United States and Mexico, after advisers in Washington warned it could look like choosing sides, according to Dex Torricke-Barton, one of Zuckerberg’s former speechwriters."  

Regarding election interference: "Facebook’s security engineers in December 2016 presented findings from a broad internal investigation, known as Project P, to senior leadership on how false and misleading news reports spread so virally during the election. When Facebook’s security team highlighted dozens of pages that had peddled false news reports, senior leaders in Washington, including Kaplan, opposed shutting them down immediately, arguing that doing so would disproportionately impact conservatives, according to people familiar with the company’s thinking. Ultimately, the company shut down far fewer pages than were originally proposed while it began developing a policy to handle these issues."

Craig Timberg, How conservatives learned to wield power inside Facebook, Wash. Post (Feb. 20, 2020, 1:20 PM): "In a world of perfect neutrality, which Facebook espouses as its goal, the political tilt of the pages shouldn’t have mattered. But in a videoconference between Facebook’s Washington office and its Silicon Valley headquarters in December 2016, the company’s most senior Republican, Joel Kaplan, voiced concerns that would become familiar to those within the company. 'We can’t remove all of it because it will disproportionately affect conservatives,; said Kaplan, a former George W. Bush White House official and now the head of Facebook’s Washington office, according to people familiar with the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity to protect professional relationships."

Related articles about Facebook

Ben Smith, What's Facebook's Deal with Donald Trump?NY Times (June 21, 2020): "Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, pulled together the dinner on Oct. 22 on short notice after he learned that Mr. Zuckerberg, the Facebook founder, and his wife, Priscilla Chan, would be in Washington for a cryptocurrency hearing on Capitol Hill, a person familiar with the planning said. The dinner, the person said, took place in the Blue Room on the first floor of the White House. The guest list included Mr. Thiel, a Trump supporter, and his husband, Matt Danzeisen; Melania Trump; Mr. Kushner; and Ivanka Trump. The president, a person who has spoken to Mr. Zuckerberg said, did most of the talking. The atmosphere was convivial, another person who got an account of the dinner said. Mr. Trump likes billionaires and likes people who are useful to him, and Mr. Zuckerberg right now is both."

Deepa Seetharaman, How a Facebook Employee Helped Trump Win--But Switched Sides for 2020, Wall St. J (Nov. 24, 2019, 3:18 PM): "One of the first things Mr. Barnes and his team advised campaign officials to do was to start running fundraising ads targeting Facebook users who liked or commented on Mr. Trump’s posts over the past month, using a product now called 'engagement custom audiences.' The product, which Mr. Barnes hand-coded, was available to a small group, including Republican and Democratic political clients. (The ad tool was rolled out widely around Election Day.) Within the first few days, every dollar that the Trump campaign spent on these ads yielded $2 to $3 in contributions, said Mr. Barnes, who added that the campaign raised millions of dollars in those first few days. Mr. Barnes frequently flew to Texas, sometimes staying for four days at a time and logging 12-hour days. By July, he says, he was solely focused on the Trump campaign. When on-site in the building that served as the Trump campaign’s digital headquarters in San Antonio, he sometimes sat a few feet from Mr. Parscale. The intense pace reflected Trump officials’ full embrace of Facebook’s platform, in the absence of a more traditional campaign structure including donor files and massive email databases."

ProPublica, FirstDraft study: Nearly 50% of Top Performing Facebook Posts on Mail-In Ballots Were False or Misleading

ProPublica and FirstDraft conducted a study of "Facebook posts using voting-related keywords — including the terms 'vote by mail,' 'mail-in ballots.' 'voter fraud' and 'stolen elections' — since early April [2020]." According to ProPublica, Donald Trump and conservatives have misprepresented that mail-in voting leads to voter fraud. That assertion has not been substantiated. For example, the Washington Post found states with all-mail elections — Colorado, Oregon and Washington— had only 372 potential irregularities of 14.6 million votes, meaning just or 0.0025%. According to a recent study by Prof. Nicolas Berlibski and others, unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud can negatively affect public confidence in elections. The false claims can significantly undermine the faith of voters, Republican or Democratic, in the electoral process, even when the misinformation is disproved by fact-checks.  

In the study, ProPublica and FirstDraft found numerous posts on Facebook that contained misinformation about mail-in ballots. The study concluded: "Of the top 50 posts, ranked by total interactions, that mentioned voting by mail since April 1, 2020 [to July 2020] contained false or substantially misleading claims about voting, particularly about mail-in ballots." ProPublica identified the popular Facebook posts by using engagement data from CrowdTangle.

Facebook’s community standards state that no one shall post content that contains “[m]isrepresentation of the . . . methods for voting or voter registration or census participation.” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently said on his Facebook page in June 2020 that he stands against “anything that incites violence or suppresses voting,” and that the company is “running the largest voting information campaign in American history . . . to connect people with authoritative information about the elections . . . crack down on voter suppression, and fight hate speech.” Facebook reportedly removed more than 100,000 posts from Facebook and Instagram that violated the company's community standard against voter suppression from March to May 2020. As ProPublica reported, California Secretary of State Alex Padilla stated that "Facebook has removed more than 90% of false posts referred to it by VoteSure, a 2018 initiative by the state of California to educate voters and flag misinformation."

However, according to the joint project by ProPublica and First Draft, Facebook is still falling well short in the efforts to stop election misinformation. Facebook fails to take down posts from individual accounts and group pages that contain false claims about mail-in ballots and voter fraud, including some portraying "people of color as the face of voter fraud." 

Facebook is reported to be considering banning political ads in the days before the election, but that hardly touches the core of the truly rampant fraud— misinformation of the public about mail ballots. False claims are far more widespread in posts than ads, according to the ProPublica and FirstDraft study.

--written by Yucheng “Quentin” Cui

Revisiting Reddit's Attempt to Stop "Secondary Infecktion" Misinformation Campaign from Russia

 

Last year, Reddit announced that it banned 61 accounts in relation to a disinformation campaign dubbed “Secondary Infecktion” led by a Russian group.  The campaign group was exposed by Facebook earlier in June 2019 for creating fake news in multiple languages that involved multiple nations, aiming to “divide, discredit, and distract Western countries” through dissemination of fake information such as assassination plans, attacks on Ukraine and its pro-Western government, and disputes between Germany and US. This time, the operation created fake accounts and uploaded “leaked UK documents” on Reddit. A research firm, Graphika Labs inspected the associated accounts and concluded these were linked to Secondary Infecktion based on same grammatical errors and language patterns.

Reddit’s investigation into suspicious accounts started with its users’ report on questionable posts. It then worked with Graphika and soon found a “pattern of coordination” similar to those reported accounts linked to Secondary Infektion, making it “use these accounts to identify additional suspect accounts that were part of the campaign on Reddit.”

As Reddit’s statement wrote, it “encourage[s] users, moderators, and 3rd parties to report things to us as soon as they see them.” This statement reflects how much Reddit depends on its community to help moderate the site. Reddit is a platform that is heavily community-based. It is a collection of forums where users share content and comments on just about anything. To the left of every post, there are two buttons – the upvote and the downvote, which allow users themselves to rate content. The total score of a post is essentially the number of upvotes minus downvotes, making the content’s position on a page based on its score rank.  Basically, a higher score means more visibility.

The voting system is liked by many users because unlike Facebook or Twitter, Reddit is more like a community curated by its users themselves. However, the voting system has its drawbacks. The system can be gamed and manipulated. First, because everyone has certain moderating power, personal beliefs and agendas may get in the way. For example, a person may create several accounts just to downvote a post with which he does not agree. As a result, information may be downgraded by gaming the systemt. Second, there's a risk of content manipulation by coordinated attacks. As the June security report stated, Reddit has been heavily focused on content manipulation around the 2020 elections and ensure minorities’ voices would be heard. Therefore, Reddit worked much on bot detection and malicious viruses. Admins have vast powers, including flagging fake accounts, and can try to ensure diversity of viewpoints and participation.

Reddit could consider changing some of its platform features. As some redditors pointed out, Reddit's “gilding” feature, which is akin to a “super-upvote,” may enable manipulation. Users can gild posts with their Gold Reddit subscription or just buy Reddit coins.  Together with the voting system, gilding may make content manipulation more easy. A malicious operation can just buy coins to promote content as they wish even without creating fake accounts. Offering subscriptions is apparently Reddit’s way to cover its cost and to profit, and subscriptions do offer other privileges such as having an ad-free experience. Nonetheless, if Reddit wants to stop content manipulation, perhaps the company needs to rethink the gilding power. 

--written by Candice Wang

 

Facebook Removes Hundreds of Accounts, Pages for Violating for Foreign Interference and Coordinated Inauthentic Behavior Policy

 

from Facebook's policy

Facebook recently reported that it removed various networks, accounts, and pages from its Facebook and Instagram platforms for violations of its foreign interference policy.

Facebook defines “foreign interference” as “coordinated inauthentic behavior on behalf of a foreign or governmental entity.” Thus, removals resulting from a violation of the foreign interference policy are based on user behavior – not content. The removed networks originated in Canada and Ecuador, Brazil, Ukraine, and the United States.

According to Nathanial Gleicher, Facebook’s Head of Security Policy, these networks involved “coordinated inauthentic behavior” (CIB). This means individuals within each network coordinated with each other through fake accounts to mislead people about who they were and what they were doing. The network removals resulted from the focus on domestic audiences and associations with commercial entities, political campaigns, and political offices.

As outlined in Facebook's report, the Canada and Ecuador network focused its activities on Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador, Chile, Uruguay, and Venezuela.  Individual accounts and pages in this network centered on elections, taking part in local debates on both sides. Some individuals would create fake accounts, posing as locals of the countries they targeted; others posed as “independent” news platforms in the countries they targeted. This network alone had 41 accounts and 77 pages on Facebook, and another 56 Instagram accounts; 274,000 followers on one or more of the 77 Facebook pages and 78,000 followers on Instagram; spent $1.38 billion on Facebook advertising.

The Brazil network spawned 35 Facebook accounts, 14 Facebook pages, 1 Facebook group, and 38 Instagram accounts. The Brazil network’s efforts used a hoard of fake and duplicate accounts – some posing as reporters, others posting fictitious news articles, and pages alleging to be news sources. This network collected nearly 883,000 followers, 350 group followers, 917,000 followers on their Instagram accounts, and it also spent $1500 on Facebook advertising.

The Ukraine network created 72 fake Facebook accounts, 35 pages, and 13 Instagram accounts. According to Facebook, this account was most active during the 2019 parliamentary and presidential elections in Ukraine. Nearly 766,000 followed one or more of this network’s fake pages, and 3,800 people followed at least one of the Instagram accounts.

The United States network possessed 54 Facebook accounts, 50 pages, and 4 Instagram accounts. Individuals in this network posed as residents of Florida – posting and commenting on their own content to make it appear more popular. Several of the network’s pages had ties to a hate group banned by Facebook in 2018. According to Facebook, this network was most active between 2015-2017. This network gained 260,000 followers on at least one of its Facebook pages and nearly 61,500 followers on Instagram. The network also spent nearly $308,000 on Facebook advertising.

In the past year alone, Facebook has removed nearly two million fake accounts and dismantled 18 coordinated public manipulation networks. Authentic decision making about voting is the cornerstone of democracy. Every twenty minutes, one million links are shared, twenty million friend requests are sent, and three million messages are sent. Despite Facebook’s efforts, it’s likely we will encounter foreign interference in one way or another online. So, each of us must take steps to protect ourselves from fake accounts and foreign manipulation.

--written by Alison Hedrick

Facebook's Oversight Board for content moderation--too little, too late to combat interference in 2020 election

Facebook for has been under fire over the spread of misinformation connected with Russian involvement in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. In April 2018, the idea for an independent oversight board was discussed when CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before Congress.

Book Preview: David Shimer’s "Rigged: America, Russia and 100 Years of Covert Electoral Interference."

 

Rigged by David Shimer presents a historical account and comprehensive analysis of how American and Russian covert electoral interference has changed over the last three decades. American operations have transformed from covert operations to public aid through non-profit organizations. Russians, however, remain committed to covert strategies – using tactics like cyber-hacking, trolling, and developing “fake news” posts on popular social media platforms, as reported by Luke Harding in a book review for the Guardian. To prepare for the book, David Shimer interviewed over 130 officials, from a former KGB general to eight previous CIA directors, and scoured archives across six countries.

Shimer defines “covert electoral interference” by three elements:

  1. Covert – “non-attributable,” e.g. “the hand of the actor is hidden,”
  2. Electoral – “targeting a democratic vote of succession,” e.g., casting ballots for a candidate, and
  3. Interference – “deploying active measures” to achieve the result.

Accordingly, in Rigged, “covert electoral interference” identifies “a concealed foreign effort to manipulate a democratic vote of succession.”

Rigged highlights American and Russian covert electoral interference operations worldwide

Shimer explains the origin of American and Russian interference in elections of third countries culminated during the Cold War. Their reasons were obvious: Americans wanted to keep the communist Russians out; Russians wanted them in. In 1947, for the first time, the CIA acted to ensure the success of pro-democratic leaders. The first operation took place in Italy, where the CIA supplied the Christian Democratic party with money, had Italian Americans write letters home, and worked closely with the Church. Three years later, the CIA conducted similar operations in Guatemala, Iran. The KGB simultaneously directed money to communist-friendly leaders in Latin America and African nations. Alternately, Russian electoral interference began in 1919, twenty-nine years before the United States’ operations, as Shimer explained to CBS.Russia first tried interfering in American elections in the 1960s and 70s, targeting Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Those attempts failed. In Rigged, Shimer highlights Russian interference in the 1960, 1968, 1976, 1984, and 2016 elections.

Rigged reveals additional details about Russian interference in 2016 US presidential election

President Obama knew there was undeniable evidence showing Russia was interfering in the 2016 election but did nothing to stop it. Whereas many believe voting tallies were not affected, some, like Harry Reid, say there is no doubt Russian interference included vote tampering.

In Rigged, Shimer argues that Putin succeeded where all other Russian leaders had failed – he has successfully divided American society and placed a Russian-friendly leader in the White House. One goal of Rigged is to dispel the myth that the 2016 election was a new phenomenon. It wasn’t. Russia’s interference in the 2016 election was a continuation of its tried and true covert operations through exploiting new technologies. Social media platforms enabled Russia to use its disruptive tactic with ease.

Shimer is certain of one thing: Russia influenced the minds of over 100 million American voters leading up to the 2016 presidential election.

Russia is targeting American minds

According to Shimer, Russia seeks to delegitimize the American presidential election by casting doubt on the fairness of the result. The goal is to undermine the American democratic system, not necessarily support one candidate over another. During the CBS interview, Shimer reminded us: “Because what Putin's after here, is chaos, is dysfunction, is corrupting democracies. Trump is a means to that end. But there are other ways of achieving it, one of which is just making Americans wonder whether their election was fair at all.”

In Rigged, Shimer argues Putin’s chief goal is to change the landscape of American politics – to elect leaders who will degrade American democracy and remove Americans’ faith in the electoral process – something we need to resist.

-written by Allison Hedrick

Meeting Between Facebook, Zuckerberg and Stop Hate for Profit Boycott Group Turns into a Big Fail

Facebook has come under scrutiny due to its handling of hate speech and disinformation posted on the platform. With the Stop Hate for Profit movement, corporations have begun to take steps to hold Facebook accountable for the disinformation that is spread on the platform. So far, more than 400 advertisers, from Coca-Cola to Ford and Lego, have made the pledge to stop advertising on the social media platform, according to NPR. Facebook has faced intense backlash, particularly since the 2016 election, for allowing disinformation and propaganda to be posted freely. The disinformation and hate, or “Fake News” as many may call it, is aimed at misinforming the voters and spreading hateful propaganda, potentially dampening voter participation.

A broad coalition of groups including Color for Change, the Anti-defamation league, and the NAACP, started the campaign Stop Hate for Profit. (For more on the origin, read Politico.) The goal of the campaign is to push Facebook to make much needed changes in its policy guidelines as well as change within the company executive employees. The boycott targets the advertising dollars for which the social media juggernaut relies upon. The campaign has begun to pick up steam with new companies announcing an end to Facebook Ads every day. With this momentum, the group behind the boycott have released a list 10 first steps Facebook can take.   

Stop Hate for Profit is asking that Facebook take accountability, have decency, and provide support to groups most affected by the hate that is spread on the platform. The civil rights leaders behind this movement are focused on making changes at the executive level as well as holding Facebook more accountable for their lackluster terms of service. The top execs currently at Facebook may have a conflict of interests. People contend that Facebook has a duty to make sure misinformation and hate is not spread, but Facebook does not exercise that to the fullest capacity because of their relationships with politicians. Rashad Robinson, president of Color of Change, contends that there needs to be a separation between the people in charge of the content allowed on Facebook and those who are aligned with political figures. The group is asking Facebook to hire an executive with a civil rights background, who can evaluate discriminatory policies and products. Additionally, the group is asking Facebook to expand on what they consider hate speech. The current terms of service that Facebook currently employs are criticized for being ineffective and problematic.   

Facebooks policies and algorithms are among the things the group asks to be changed. Current Facebook policies allow public and private hate groups to exist and also recommend them to many users.  The campaign asks that Facebook remove far-right groups that spread conspiracies, such as QAnon, from the platform. The labeling of inauthentic information that will cause hate and disinformation is also requested. In contrast, Twitter has taken small steps to label hateful content themselves. While many criticize Twitters actions not being far enough, they have taken steps Facebook has yet to take. Through this entire process, Facebook should make transparent to the public all the steps--in the number of ads rejected for hate or disinformation and in the third-party audit of hate spread on the site.  

The group also made a connection between the hate on the Facebook platform and race issues within the company. Stop Hate for Profit, provided a staggering statistic that 42% of Facebook users experience harassment on the platform. This along with the former black employee and two job candidates who filed EEOC complaints points to a culture at Facebook that goes far beyond allowing far-right propaganda and misinformation on the site but highlights a lack of support for users and employees of color. All of this is used to backup why it is essential that Facebook goes beyond making simple statements and actually make steps to create change.

Facebook CEO and cofounder Mark Zuckerberg agreed to meet with the civil rights groups behind the boycott amid the growing number of companies getting behind Stop Profit for Hate. Many have voiced their concerns that Facebook and CEO Zuckerberg are more concerned about messaging that legitimately fixing the underlying problems.  Upon meeting with Mark Zuckerberg on July 7, Stop Hate for Profit released a statement about what they felt was a disappointing and uneventful meeting. The group asserted that Facebook did what they previously feared, only providing surface level rhetoric with no real interest in committing to any real change. Of the ten recommendations, Zuckerberg was only open to addressing hiring a person with a civil rights background. Although he declined to fully commit to that position, if it is created, being a C-suite executive level position. Rashad Robinson tweeted a direct statement, saying that Facebook was not ready to make any changes despite knowing the demands of the group. That view appears to be consistent with a July 2, 2020 report of a remark by Zuckerberg to employees at a virtual town hall: "We're not gonna change our policies or approach on anything because of a threat to a small percent of our revenue, or to any percent of our revenue."

For now, it remains to be seen if the increased pressure from companies pulling advertisements will eventually cause Facebook and Zuckerberg to institute changes that progressive groups have been pushing for years. So far, it appears not.   

--written by Bisola Oni

Can 2020 US Presidential Election Be Canceled: COVID-19, Voting-by-Mail and Other Safeguards During a Pandemic

 

The United States is experiencing another wave in coronavirus infections, with twenty-one states seeing an increase in their daily infection rates. With alarm bells ringing, many have expressed logistical concerns about the upcoming presidential election. There are two main concerns about Election Day 2020, which is November 3, 2020:

  1. Postponement or cancellation of the election; and
  2. Mitigation of the increasing coronavirus infection rate at polling locations.

Canceling or postponing Election Day 2020 is highly unlikely.

The president does not have the legal authority to cancel the November 3rd election. First, federal statute specifes "the Tuesday next after the first Monday in the month of November" shall be federal Election Day. Moreover, the states are the ones who conduct the operations of elections in each state. And only states have the power to change their election laws, according to Jason Harrow, executive director and chief counsel of Equal Citizens.

Rest assured, overstaying one’s welcome at the White House is not possible. The Constitution prevents presidents from remaining in office past their elected term. Under the 20th Amendment, the president’s term automatically ends on January 20th at noon after a four-year term.  If a candidate hasn’t been elected by then, Congress decided long ago the Speaker of the House will become acting president. 

Congress can’t cancel the election either. But Congress can postpone the election by passing a new federal law. Under Article II, § 1 of the Constitution, Congress has the power to determine the date the election takes place. Thus, Congress could pass a bill before November – but it’s unlikely. As Jerry Goldfeder explains, American presidents and legislators have never canceled or postponed any of the fifty-eight previous presidential elections – not for wars, not for terrorist attacks, and not for the Spanish flu. There is little doubt the presidential election will take place. Nonetheless, the logistics are unclear.

How can Americans stay safe and exercise their constitutional right to vote?

It’s reasonable to say Election Day this year will not be postponed or canceled. So, what other options do Americans have? Currently, four ideas are being pushed forward:

  1. Expanding the number of polling places;
  2. Encouraging early voting;
  3. Developing a time span (e.g., two weeks) within which people can vote; and
  4. Expanding voting-by-mail and absentee voting.

After conducting the research, voting-by-mail is the most tenable path forward to mitigate risks of exposure to the coronavirus.

Reports by the Brennan Center for Justice and Leadership Conference on Civil Rights show polling place expansion is unlikely. Since 2012, states around the country have closed nearly two thousand polling places. The pandemic has fanned the flames of this trend. For this to work, states need to open more locations where voters can cast their votes and train a horde of new polling volunteers before November – both of which are not likely.

Early voting would help with social distancing measures by reducing crowd sizes. But some states, like Utah, have canceled their early voting options. As more Americans contract the coronavirus, it is unclear whether this is will be an option for voters in November. Legislators have not yet jumped on the “time-frame” option for in-person voting. The fourth option, voting-by-mail, is the most controversial.

Fact Check: Cases of Voter Fraud in the Voting-by-Mail Context Is Rare.

Twitter sparked controversy when it added a “fact check” label to President Trump’s tweet about California’s expansion of voting-by-mail procedures for the presidential election. In the tweet, President Trump claimed voting-by-mail expansions would lead to “rigged elections.” But Trump himself voted by mail in 2018, and, in the past, Mike Pence, Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, Kayleigh McEnany, Bill Barr, Besty DeVos, Larry Kudlow, Wilbur Ross, Kellyanne Conway, and Alex Azar [source]. 

But should Americans be concerned about voter fraud in the context of voting-by-mail?

According to surveys and polls, 72-78% of American voters want the option to vote-by-mail in the upcoming presidential election. At this time, 33 states allow voting-by-mail without an excuse. 5 states conduct all elections by mail.  In response to the pandemic, many states have changed their voting procedures – forty-six states, both Democratic and Republican controlled, now allow voting-by-mail in some form.

According to MIT’s Election Data and Science Lab, voting-by-mail began during the Civil War, where soldiers on both sides cast their ballots from the battlefield. Since then, instances of voter fraud have been rare. Two most infamous cases occurred in Florida (acts of false witnessing) and Georgia (selling votes). More recently, a Republican campaign representative in Maryland got caught collecting blank ballots and filling the ballots out in favor of a former congressional candidate, Mike Harris.

Experts reject the recent hype about voter fraud in the voting-by-mail context. Over the past two decades, 250,000 votes were submitted via mail-in ballots. Based on the Heritage Foundation’s database on voter fraud, only 1,285 instances of voter fraud were found, yielding 1,110 criminal convictions. From the 1,110 convictions, only 204 cases concerned alleged fraudulent use of absentee ballots. You can find a detailed record of every voter fraud case here. This means over twenty years, there have been about ten cases of voter fraud per year.

The risk of voter fraud in this context is only a fraction of a percent, 0.0816%. Context: You are more likely to be struck by lightning in your lifetime, with a 0.033% chance, than to witness “widespread” voter fraud taking place during the 2020 presidential election. Perspective: The chances of dying from coronavirus in the United States is 4.795%.  Of course, with any voting procedure, safeguards need to be implemented. Professor Ned Foley, an election law expert, has identified a need for states to clarify their procedures should a candidate contest the results of mail-in ballots, in a much discussed article "Why Vote-by-Mail Could be a Legal Nightmare in November." Foley recommends: "But states — especially battlegrounds in the presidential election — should clarify as soon as possible the rules that their own courts are supposed to use in litigation that might arise over counting absentee ballots. It is not enough that state law has rules for casting ballots. There needs to be clarity on whether ballots can still count if something has gone wrong in the process of casting of them, especially if the problem is not the voter’s fault."

Standing in long lines, for countless hours, is not a reasonable option this election season because it will certainly increase the spread of the deadly virus. Foley warns: "There’s no question that, for public health reasons, expanding vote-by-mail is a wise decision for states to be making right now."

It’s clear:  Voting-by-mail is not perfect or full-proof. There are rare instances that justify some degree of concern. However, states should allow voting-by-mail due to the higher risk of contracting the coronavirus.​

-written by Allison Hedrick

 

US Senate Intelligence Committee Issues 4th Report on Russian Interference Based on 2017 Intelligence Committee Assessment

 

On April 21, 2020, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee published the fourth and penultimate volume of an extensive report on Russian Active Measures Campaigns and Interference in the 2016 U.S. Election. Volume 4 is titled “Review of the Intelligence Community Assessment.” It examines the 2017 Intelligence Committee Assessment (ICA) that determined that Russia interfered with the 2016 U.S. election. The Committee examined the sources and work behind creating the ICA, amidst the controversy over the U.S. intelligence investigation raised by the Trump Administration, which claimed it was politically motivated against him. The Senate Intelligence Committee report repudiates that notioin. In accordance with protecting the identities of the sources behind the ICA, much of the 157-page report has been redacted. The report unanimously concludes that the findings in the 2017 ICA back up the suspected aggressive propaganda campaign and interference conducted by Russia in the 2016 U.S. election.

Volume 4's unredacted factual background and the key findings of the examination of the ICA provide a clear view of the Committee's finding. The Committee's examination of the ICA was conducted by reviewing source documents along with interviews with officials involved in preparing the assessment. In reviewing the ICA, the Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-NC) stated the committee looked at two key issues: (1) whether the final product of the ICA met the task assigned by the President; and (2) if the analysis was backed by the intelligence provided in the ICA. Burr concluded that the analysis and conclusion in the ICA were strong. No reason could be found to dispute the findings by the Intelligence Community. In a statement, Chairman Burr concluded: "The I.C.A. reflects strong tradecraft, sound analytical reasoning and proper justification of disagreement in the one analytical line where it occurred. The committee found no reason to dispute the intelligence community’s conclusions.”

The warnings of continued Russian interference and also the vigilance needed due to continued interference for the 2020 election were reaffirmed in the ICA. Russia sought to interfere with the 2016 election to harm the candidacy of Secretary HIllary Clinton and to help elect then-candidate Donald Trump. The Russian interference did not stop after the 2016 election. Russia has continued to interfere with American democracy and the extent of the aggressive attacks as noted in ICA is not exaggerated, the Senate report determined. Both Chairman Burr and Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-VA) concluded there is no doubt that Russia will once again interfere in the 2020 election as they did in 2016.

While much of the report is redacted, the key findings validate the 2017 ICA:

  1. The ICA met the task assigned by the President; providing a bipartisan analysis of the Russian interference. None of the individuals involved in the drafting of the ICA were biased to reach specified conclusions by a particular political party, because of this the ICA provided an accurate reporting of the Russian interference during the 2016 election.
  2. The aggressive and unprecedented nature of Russia’s interference on the 2016 election is well documented in the ICA. The reporting does not far exceed its reach, with regards to warning policy makers of Russia’s role.
  3. It is important to note that within the ICA no policy recommendation was made in regard to combatting future Russian interference. While it is all but assured that Russia will again interfere in 2020, no recommendations are given. The lack of policy suggestion is intentional. The intelligence committee themselves do not make any policy, they are simply set aside to provide detailed analysis and warnings to those in place to lawfully create policy.
  4. It is noteworthy that the ICA does not include much information about any attempt that Russia made to interfere with the election in 2008 and 2012. Instead making it clear the actions in 2016 were unprecedented.

The Committee did find that the ICA fell short in certain areas. While the ICA provided a comprehensive insight about 2016 and warnings about Russia’s continued interference, they did not delve into Russian propaganda through state-owned media platforms. The lack of insight into media networks such of RT’s coverage on the leaks from Wikileaks’ containing information about the Democratic National Committee would have aided in further substantiating the full brevity of the Russian propaganda.  

Volume 4 further substantiates the need for greater steps to stop Russian interference in the U.S. election. A fifth and final volume is expected by the Committee as part of its report on the Russian interference on the election.

-written by Bisola Oni

Why Voters Should Beware: Lessons from Russian Interference in 2016 Election, Political and Racial Polarization on Social Media

Overview of the Russian Interference Issue

The United States prides itself on having an open democracy, with free and fair elections decided by American voters. If Americans want a policy change, then the remedy most commonly called upon is political participation--and the vote. If Americans want change, then they should vote out the problematic politicians and choose public officials to carry out the right policies. However, what if the U.S. voting system is skewed by foreign interference? 

American officials are nearly unanimous in concluding, based on U.S. intelligence, that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential elections [see, e.g., here; here; and Senate Intelligence Report].  “[U]ndermining confidence in America’s democratic institutions” is what Russia seeks. In 2016, few in the U.S. were even thinking about this type of interference. The US’s guard was down. Russia interfered with the election in various ways including fake campaign advertisements, bots on Twitter and Facebook that pumped out emotionally and politically charged content, and through spread of disinformation or “fake news.” Social media hacking, as opposed to physical-polling-center hacking, is at the forefront of discussion because it can not only change who is in office, but it also can shift American voters’ political beliefs and understanding of political topics or depress voters from voting. 

And, if you think Russia is taking a break this election cycle, you'd be wrong. According to a March 10, 2020 New York Times article, David Porter of the FBI Foreign Influence Task Force says: "We see Russia is willing to conduct more brazen and disruptive influence operations because of how it perceives its conflict with the West."

What Inteference Has to Do with Political Polarization

Facebook and Twitter have been criticized countless times by various organizations, politicians, and the media for facilitating political polarization. The U.S. political system of mainly two dominamnt parties is especially susceptible to political polarization. Individuals belonging to either party become so invested in those party’s beliefs that they do not just see the other party’s members as different but also wrong and detrimental to the future of the country. In the past twenty years, the amount of people who consistently hold conservative views or liberal views went from 10% to 20%, thus showing the increasing division, according to an article in Greater Good Magazine.

Political polarization is facilitated by platforms like Facebook and Twitter because of their content algorithms, which are designed to make the website experience more enjoyable. The Facebook News Feed “ranks stories based on a variety of factors including their history of clicking on links for particular websites,” as described by a Brookings article. Under the algorithm, if a liberal user frequently clicks on liberally skewed content, that is what they are going to see the most. Research shows this algorithm reduced the cross-cutting of political “content by 5 percent for conservatives and 8 percent for liberals.” Thus, the algorithm limits your view of other opinions.

So, you might ask, “Why is that bad? I want to see content more aligned with my beliefs.” Democracy is built on the exchange of varying political views and dissenting opinions. The US has long stood by the reputation of freedom of speech and encouraging a free flow of ideas. This algorithmic grouping of like-minded people can be useful when it comes to hobbies and interests, however when it comes to consistently grouping individuals based on political beliefs, it can have a negative impact on democracy. This grouping causes American users to live in “filter bubbles” that only expose them to content that aligns with their viewpoints. Users tend to find this grouping enjoyable due to the psychological theory of confirmation bias, which means that individuals are more likely to consume content that aligns with their pre-existing beliefs. So, all the articles about Trump successfully leading the country will be the first ranked on a conservative user’s Facebook newsfeed and will also be the most enjoyable for them. This filter bubble is dangerous to a democratic system because the lack of diverse perspectives when consuming news content encourages close-mindedness and increases distrust in anyone who disagrees.

During the 2016 presidential election, the Russian hackers put out various types of fake articles, campaign advertisements, and social media posts that were politically charged on either the liberal or conservative side. Because the Facebook algorithm shows more conservative content to conservatives and same for liberals, hackers had no problem reaching their desired audience quickly and effectively. On Facebook they created thousands of robot computer programs that would enter various interest groups and engage with their target audience. For example, in 2016, a Russian soldier successfully entered a U.S. Facebook group pretending to be a 42-year-old housewife, as reported by Time. He responded to political issues discussed on that group and he used emotional and political buzz words when bringing up political issues and stories. On Twitter, thousands of fake accounts run by Russians and computer robots were used to spread disinformation about Hillary Clinton by continuously mentioning her email scandal from when she was Secretary of State and a fake Democratic pedophilic ring called “Pizzagate.” These robots would spew hashtags like “#MAGA” and “#CrookedHillary” that took up more than a quarter of the content within these hashtags.

Facebook and Twitter’s Response to the 2016 Russian Interference

According to a Wall Street Journal article on May 26, 2020 and a Washington Post article on June 28, 2020, Facebook had an internal review of how Facebook could reduce polarization on its platform following the 2016 election, but CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other executives decided against the recommended changes because it was seen as "paternalistic" and would potentially affect conservatives on Facebook more. 

After becoming under increasing fire from critics for allowing misinformation and hate speech to go unchecked on Facebook, the company announced some changes to "fight polarization" on May 27, 2020. This initiative included a recalibration of each user’s Facebook News Feed which would prioritize their family and friends’ content over divisive news content. Their reasoning was that data shows people are more likely to have meaningful discourse with people they know, and this would foster healthy debate rather than ineffective, one-off conversations. They also mentioned a policy directly targeting the spread of disinformation on the platform. They say they have implemented an independent-fact-checking program that will automatically check content in over 50 languages around the world for false information.  Disinformation that will potentially contribute to “imminent violence, physical harm, and voter suppression,” will be removed. 

But those modest changes weren't enough to mollify Facebook's critics. Amidst the mass nationwide protests of the Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin's brutal killing of George Floyd, nonprofit organizations including Color for Change organized an ad boycott against Facebook. Over 130 companies agreed to remove their ads from Facebook during July or longer. That led Zuckerberg to change his position on exempting politicians from fact checking or the company's general policy on misinformation. Zuckerberg said that politicians would now be subject to the same policy as every other Facebook user and would be flagged if they disseminated misinformation (or hate speech) that violates Facebook's general policy. 

Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey not only implemented a fact-checking policy similar to Facebook, but also admitted that the company needed to be more transparent in their policy making. The fact checking policy “attached fact-checking notices” at the bottom of various tweets alerting users that there could be fake claims in those tweets.  Twitter also decided to forbig all political advertising on its platform. In response to Twitter's flagging of his content, President Trump issued an executive order to increase social media platform regulation and stop them from deleting users’ content and censoring their speech.

With the 2020 U.S. election only four months away, Internet companies are still figuring out how to stop Russian interference and the spread of misinformation, hate speech, and political polarization intended to interfere with the election. Whether Internet companies succeed remains to be seen.  But there's been more policy changes and decisions by Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Snapchat, Twitch, and other platforms in the last month than all of last year. 

-by Mariam Tabrez

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