Censorship continues to run rampant in the U.S. and elsewhere, particularly when it comes to information regarding public health. It was for this reason, along with their unscrupulous data mining efforts, that I left Facebook in 2019.

The social media outlet, however, continues to censor posts from organizations seeking to share health truths, including Children’s Health Defense (CHD), whose mission is to end childhood health epidemics by eliminating harmful exposures, holding those responsible accountable and establishing safeguards to prevent further harms.¹

As a result, the nonprofit organization, which was founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., sued Facebook, its CEO Mark Zuckerberg and three of its “fact-checking” partners for censoring their truthful public health posts and fraudulently misrepresenting and defaming CHD.²

Facebook Censorship ‘at Odds With the First Amendment’

CHD takes aim at corruption in federal agencies, including the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Federal Communications Commission and the World Health Organization, as well as the pharmaceutical and telecom industries. They share information regarding vaccine safety, which was targeted by Facebook’s censorship efforts.

On CHD’s Facebook page, the social media giant added a label stating, “This page posts about vaccines,” along with a link to the CDC for “reliable, up to date information.”³ They also deactivated the page’s donate button — stopping fundraising efforts — and prohibited CHD from buying online advertisements.

They also added a warning in gray overlay stating that their independent fact checkers found false information, which, according to CHD, “has the intended effect of reducing both click-throughs to the underlying content and shares. The net effect is to drastically reduce by 95% the traffic to Children’s Health Defense website.”⁴

By deactivating CHD’s donate button and using deceptive forms of technology like shadow banning, which essentially renders posts invisible to the public without the user knowing, Facebook attempted to silence CHD’s criticism of government policies and pharmaceutical products. According to CHD:⁵

“In short, Facebook and the government colluded to silence CHD and its followers. Such tactics are fundamentally at odds with the First Amendment, which guarantees the American public the benefits to democracy from free flow of information in the marketplace of ideas.

It forbids the government from censoring private speech — particularly speech that criticizes government policies or officials.”

Facebook Has ‘Insidious Conflicts’

CHD’s complaint cites Facebook’s coordinated censorship campaign with WHO and the CDC, which takes on renewed meaning when you consider that such censorship began at the request of Adam Schiff, a congressman and Intelligence Committee chairman representative, who asked Facebook to “suppress and purge” the internet of content that criticized government vaccine policies in March 2019.⁶

As a result, any statements that go against the U.S. government’s statements are deemed misinformation, even if they’re true. According to CHD, “Facebook has insidious conflicts with the pharmaceutical industry and its captive health agencies and has economic stakes in telecom and 5G. Facebook currently censors CHD’s page, targeting its purge against factual information about vaccines, 5G and public health agencies.”⁷

After the censorship began, WHO commended Facebook for the campaign in connection with public health officials. Ironically, Zuckerberg has stated publically that it’s not the job of social media to be an arbiter of truth, yet he works with government agencies to suppress pages that contradict the official government rhetoric.⁸