which will be taking place later this year. He also tackled Mark
Zuckerberg after he suggested that Twitter was trying to be “an arbiter
of truth”.
The exchange ensued after Twitter applied its fact-check label to two tweets shared by President Donald Trump, which prompted readers to fact check the president’s claims.
Dorsey’s response was spured by a Fox News appearance by senior White
House advisor Kellyanne Conway, where she goaded viewers to harass
Twitter’s head of site integrity, Yoel Roth.
He stated that Trump’s tweets were fact-checked because they “may
mislead people into thinking they don’t need to register to get a
ballot.”
Dorsey tweeted;
Fact check: there is someone ultimately accountable for our actions
as a company, and that’s me. Please leave our employees out of this.
We’ll continue to point out incorrect or disputed information about
elections globally. And we will admit to and own any mistakes we make.Per our Civic Integrity policy
(https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/election-integrity-policy…),
the tweets yesterday may mislead people into thinking they don’t need
to register to get a ballot (only registered voters receive ballots).
We’re updating the link on @realDonaldTrump’s tweet to make this more
clear.
Mark Zuckerberg’s comment in which he outlined Facebook’s obsessively
neutral approach to policing its platform with Twitter’s present
situation in an interview with Fox News, was also addressed by the
Twitter CEO.
Zuckerberg had said;
“We have a different policy than, I think, Twitter on this.
“I just believe strongly that Facebook shouldn’t be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online.
“Private companies probably shouldn’t be, especially these platform companies, shouldn’t be in the position of doing that.”
Reacting to the comment, Dorsey rejected Zuckerberg’s tag and also cited the company’s Civic Integrity Policy.
He added;
This does not make us an “arbiter of truth.” Our intention is to
connect the dots of conflicting statements and show the information in
dispute so people can judge for themselves. More transparency from us is
critical so folks can clearly see the why behind our actions.
The company also made a clarification on its decision to add a fact-checking link to two of Trump’s tweets.
It read;
We added a label to two @realDonaldTrump Tweets about California’s
vote-by-mail plans as part of our efforts to enforce our civic integrity
policy. We believe those Tweets could confuse voters about what they
need to do to receive a ballot and participate in the election process.
On Wednesday evening, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany
told reporters President Trump would soon sign an executive order
“pertaining to social media,” widely expected to be a shocking though
likely unsubstantial strike back at Twitter’s policy enforcement choices
this week.
The order may rehash the White House’s previous stalled efforts to
threaten Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a vital legal
provision underpinning the modern internet and wielding power against
social media companies through the FTC and FCC.
Ahead of the expected retaliation, Trump tweeted “Stay Tuned!!!” to his more than 80 million followers.
