24,000+ Call on Congress to Stop Facebook From Fueling Far-Right Extremism by Passing a Federal Data Privacy Law
Facebook’s algorithmic manipulation is fueling the extremism that led to the January 6 attack. Data privacy is fundamental to disarming Facebook’s data weapon.
Today, Fight for the Future, Senator Ron Wyden, and a coalition of civil and human rights groups delivered a petition signed by over 24,000 people calling on Congress to pass a federal data privacy law. Coalition members urged lawmakers to protect against attacks like that on the Capitol last year by addressing Facebook's data-fueled algorithmic manipulation.
When Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen testified before Congress in October, she named algorithmic manipulation as the platform's source of power. Algorithmic manipulation is only possible with invasive and copious personal data on individual people, harvested via mass surveillance.
The anniversary of January 6 falls at the beginning of the midterm election cycle, further highlighting how Facebook's algorithmic manipulation is a threat to our democracy and election integrity because it intensifies the far-right extremism that led to the attack on the Capitol. In order to #StopFacebook, lawmakers must focus on cutting off the fuel supply for Facebook's data weapon by passing a federal data privacy law.
Speakers at the petition delivery included Senator Wyden and representatives from Fight for the Future, Access Now, Public Citizen, and Open Media.
Senator Ron Wyden stated, "If we had a strong privacy law on the books, Mark Zuckerberg would already be in jail for his serial lying about Facebook's abuse of Americans' data. Congress has the opportunity to act now by passing a comprehensive privacy law that can cut off the flow of data to Facebook's outrage machine by setting strong new rules for how companies can collect, share and use Americans' personal information. That will go right to Facebook's business model and hit its bottom line, which seems to be the only thing that company cares about."
Erica Darragh, campaigner at Fight for the Future, added, "Facebook's business model has evolved into social engineering via psychological warfare. The platform weaponizes user data to fuel algorithmic manipulation in order to maximize ad sales - not just for products, but for ideas like the disinformation that led to the conspiracy theories associated with the January 6 Capitol attack. If Congress is serious about addressing the harms of social media, holding Big Tech accountable, and protecting our democracy, they must prioritize data privacy legislation in time to protect the integrity of the midterm elections."
Willmary Escoto, U.S. Policy Analyst at Access Now stated, "How many whistleblowers will it take for the U.S. Congress to rein in Silicon Valley? We need a federal data privacy law in the United States, and we need it now. Our data is harvested and weaponized against us, fueling algorithmic discrimination against the most marginalized communities and violating our right to privacy. People are fed up, and the tens of thousands of petition signatures urging Congress to pass a data protection law are a rallying cry for action."
Matt Hatfield, Campaigns Director at Open Media, said "The secretive collection, sale and algorithmic manipulation of our personal data by platforms like Facebook must end. It is a primary driver of the virality of the misinformation, hate speech, and online radicalization that people across the political spectrum are worried about. Congress passing a strong data protection law in 2022 that limits these practices will be one of the most important steps they can take to safeguard democracy and protect freedom of speech, both in America and around the world."
Public Citizen Executive Vice President Lisa Gilbert added, "As we approach the one year 'anniversary' of January 6th, we demand that Facebook be held accountable for the harm it has caused. Public Citizen stands with our allies to call on Congress to show the world its commitment to a transparent social media ecosystem that protects our digital civil rights and enhances, not hinders, democracy both at home and abroad."
Other coalition members and Congressional allies shared their perspectives as well:
Senator Richard Blumenthal stated, "We must put a stop to Big Tech's extreme exploitation of Americans' sensitive personal information. Unfettered access to troves of data that reveal private details of people's lives, identities, and preferences only fuels dangerous algorithms designed to divide us all. Comprehensive consumer privacy legislation is an essential component of reigning in Big Tech's power over American life."
Maaike van Dorssen, Managing Board Member of UK-based The London Story, noted, "Despite the progress of European data privacy laws, Big Tech remains able to use surveillance technologies to manipulate social and economic behaviours. In order to safeguard democracy and public debate in European Nations, the United States, and around the world, we urge governments to address algorithmic manipulation."
Jose Alonso Munoz, Deputy Communications Director of United We Dream, said, "Facebook has prioritized profit over the safety of its users, especially Black, brown and immigrant communities. Facebook's algorithm continues to amplify disinformation, hate speech, and conspiracy theories. This harmful disinformation played an outsized role in the attack on our democracy on January 6, and has continued to embolden Republican-led legislatures across the country to attack the voting rights of Black, brown, and immigrant communities. The 1 million members of United We Dream know all too well the importance of finding community online, including on UWD's pages on platforms like Facebook, which is why it is imperative for Congress to take action to impede Facebook's continued misuse of our data. It's time Congress ensures Facebook puts our safety over their profits."
Fight for the Future is the organization behind the coalition site HowToStopFacebook.org, which more than 70 organizations have signed onto calling for strong federal data privacy protections.
Fight for the Future is a group of artists, engineers, activists, and technologists who have been behind the largest online protests in human history, channeling Internet outrage into political power to win public interest victories previously thought to be impossible. We fight for a future where technology liberates -- not oppresses -- us.
(508) 368-302668 'Summer of Heat' Activists Arrested in NYC Protesting Citgroup's Fossil Fuel Financing
"Citi's business model is frying our planet," said one campaigner.
Scores of activists were arrested Friday during a protest outside Citigroup's New York City headquarters, where demonstrators condemned what organizers called the megabank's "racist investments devastating Black and brown communities" and fueling the worsening climate emergency.
Around 1,000 people including environmental leaders from the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana gathered at Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan's Financial District, where they rallied before marching to "demand that Wall Street stop funding the fossil fuel projects causing environmental devastation in mostly Black and brown communities in the Gulf South and across the globe."
The march ended at Citigroup's headquarters on the west side of Lower Manhattan, where organizers from New York Communities for Change said 68 people were arrested. The group said a total of 259 activists have been arrested during ongoing Summer of Heat on Wall Street protests, which it organized along with Stop the Money Pipeline, Climate Defenders, and Planet Over Profit.
"On Monday, climate activists from the Gulf South and allies held a roving speak out in front of financial institutions backing the fossil fuel industry, including KKR, BlackRock, and Bank of America," New York Communities for Change said. "On Wednesday, protesters held a civil disobedience action in front of the insurance conglomerate Chubb, which insures petrochemical projects destroying the climate in the Gulf South and around the globe."
One of the protest's organizers, Roishetta Ozane—who founded the Vessel Project of Louisiana—said that "projects that kill our communities like Freeport LNG (liquefied natural gas), Cameron LNG, Corpus Christi LNG, and others would not exist without the backing of financial institutions like Citigroup."
"Money made from them is blood money," Ozane added. "Since they destroy our homes, we're coming to pay them a visit. We will break this cycle of violence and exploitation now because later is too late. We want Citigroup to stop funding fossil fuels and to stop hurting our communities and our families."
As Stop the Money Pipeline coordinator Alec Connon explained in an opinion piece published earlier this month by Common Dreams:
Since the adoption of the Paris agreement in 2015, Citi has provided $204.46 billion in financing to the company's most rapidly developing new coal, oil, and gas fields. Remarkably, Citi has provided more money to those oil and gas companies than even JPMorgan Chase―the bank that climate activists like to call the 'Doomsday Bank.'
To be clear, I'm talking here only about the financing Citi has provided for companies developing new oil and gas reserves, not merely investing in infrastructure to keep the oil pumping from existing reserves. When we take into account financing to all fossil fuel companies, Citi has provided a little shy of $400 billion to coal, oil, and gas companies since 2015.
Citigroup contends that it is "supporting the transition to a low-carbon economy through our net zero commitments and our $1 trillion sustainable finance goal," and that its "approach reflects the need to transition while also continuing to meet global energy needs."
However, Climate Defenders organizing director Marlena Fontes countered that "Citi's business model is frying our planet."
"Every credible climate scientist says that we can't afford to put one more penny into fossil fuels, but Citi is the number one funder of fossil fuel expansion in the world," Fontes added. "Until Citi stops funding fossil fuels, they can expect resistance from everyday people like us who want our children to be able to play outside without coughing on wildfire smoke or getting sick from deadly heatwaves."
GOP Attack on Biodiversity, Climate 'Sticks Finger in the Eye of American People'
Critics of a House appropriations bill that guts environmental agencies warn it's a sign of what the Republicans will do if they retake the Senate and the presidency next year.
Democrats and watchdog groups reacted with outrage on Friday as a U.S. House environmental subcommittee led by Republicans approved an appropriations bill that would reduce funding for two federal agencies and limit their ability to protect the environment.
The House Appropriations Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee voted to advance a bill to weaken the regulatory capacities of the Department of the Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), cutting funding for conservation, climate action, national parks, and environmental justice initiatives.
"This bill sticks a finger in the eye of the American people who care deeply about clean air, climate change, endangered species, and responsible use of public lands," said Greta Anderson, deputy director of Western Watersheds Project. "It's a nasty wishlist to defund the priorities of protecting a livable future."
The fiscal year 2025 bill proposes a 20% cut to the EPA's annual budget, from $9.2 billion to $7.4 billion, including a $749 million cut to state and tribal assistance grants. It also proposes reductions to many Interior agency budgets, including a $210 million cut to the National Park Service and a $144 million cut to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Taking aim at the government's ability to regulate industry, most of the Republicans' spending allocations are below fiscal year 2024 and almost all of them are below the amount requested by the Biden administration.
Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), the subcommittee's ranking Democrat, said in a statement that the proposed EPA cut was "irresponsible" and that she was "greatly disappointed and frustrated" by the bill, which "completely disregards the reality of a warming planet and ignores the need for us to do more, not less."
Pingree's Democratic colleague, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the ranking member of the full appropriations committee, agreed.
The bill "promotes dirty energy, taking the side of fossil fuel companies and those who deny the scientific reality rather than address the escalating risk to our economy and national security presented by the changing climate and growing number of extreme weather events," DeLauro said in the statement.
Critics of the bill also objected to the large number of "poison-pill" riders that seek to undo Biden administration rules and undermine the Endangered Species Act by naming specific animals for which listing can't be funded. Per a Trump-era Interior rule, the legislation also delists most gray wolf populations from the ESA.
"This proposal is a hatchet job of disastrous proportion that in an unprecedented scale, targets our nation's most imperiled species and the law saving them from extinction," Robert Dewey, vice president of government relations at Defenders of Wildlife, said in a statement.
The Republicans' bill includes proposed reductions to funding for clean water infrastructure projects, which Food and Water Watch (FWW) said was a step in the wrong direction—water and sewer systems need huge infusions of money just to meet current water quality standards.
"The proposed cuts would leave many with unsafe water and exacerbate the nation’s water affordability crisis, adding more pressure on household water bills at a time when families are already grappling with soaring costs for essential services," Mary Grant, a FWW campaign director, said in a statement, calling safe water "non-negotiable."
Grant said that to safeguard Americans' clean water from "foolishly political annual appropriations battles," Congress should pass the Water Affordability, Transparency, Equity, And Reliability (WATER) Act—a call she also made last year, when the same subcommittee advanced a similar bill.
The full appropriations committee will consider the bill on July 9. If the bill passes through the committee and then the full chamber, as last year's version did, it's unlikely to make headway in the Democratic-controlled U.S. Senate. However, critics of the bill warned that it's a sign of what the Republicans will do if they retake the Senate and the presidency.
Earlier this month, presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump said that he plans to gut federal agencies dealing with climate, such as the Interior Department. A union of EPA workers rebuked Trump for the remarks.
Supreme Court Refuses to Rescue Prison-Bound Steve Bannon
When he's done serving his four-month sentence for flouting congressional subpoenas, the former top Trump adviser faces a federal trial over the We Build the Wall scam.
Steve Bannon, a onetime senior adviser to former U.S. President Donald Trump who was convicted of defying congressional subpoenas related to the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection, must report to prison Monday after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his 11th-hour bid to avert his four-month sentence.
In a single-sentence order with no public dissents, the Supreme Court stated that Bannon's "application for release pending appeal presented to the chief justice and by him referred to the court is denied."
In July 2022, a federal jury found Bannon guilty of two counts of contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena from the U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. That October, he was sentenced to four months in prison and fined $6,500. Bannon has remained free pending appeals and has benefited from a pause imposed by Judge Carl Nichols, a Trump appointee.
David Schoen, an attorney for Bannon, toldThe Washington Post on Friday: "I fully believe the conviction will be reversed and it is a shame to see it mishandled like this. He never should be going to jail for even a day."
However, Bannon not only faces four months behind bars for flouting Congress, another federal trial awaits him over his alleged conspiracy to commit mail fraud and money laundering in connection with the
We Build the Wall fundraising scam.