By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
WASHINGTON (Worthy News) – The founder of social media giant Meta pledged Tuesday to dismiss “fact-checkers,” “dramatically reduce the amount of censorship,” and recommend more political content on its platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.
Mark Zuckerberg also appointed three new members of Meta’s board of directors, including Dana White, the president and CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), a key figure in the orbit of U.S. President-elect Donald J. Trump.
Following the announcements, Worthy News was again able to publish on Facebook its investigative story on the United Nations’ efforts to push its narrative on climate change and other issues via artificial intelligence (AI) and media.
Facebook banned the story because it “goes against our community standards.”
Meta and other tech giants had come under pressure over what critics view as their censoring of conservative and Christian content.
Last month’s Facebook ban isn’t the first time “this has happened to us,” said Worthy News Editor-in-Chief and Founder George Whitten. “We were among the first to report on the laptop contents of Joe Biden’s son, who was later convicted on tax and gun charges. Facebook also removed that story” ahead of the 2020 presidential elections.
Yet, on Tuesday, Zuckerberg appeared to change his tune. With Donald J. Trump’s inauguration as America’s 47th president less than two weeks away, he vowed to prioritize free speech afterward and said that starting in the U.S., he would “get rid of fact-checkers and replace them with community notes similar to X.”
PLATFORM X
X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, owned by Elon Musk, relies on other users to add caveats and context to contentious posts.
In a significant change, Zuckerberg said Meta’s “fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created.”
He added that the tech firm’s content moderation teams will be moved from California to Texas “where there is less concern about the bias of our teams.”
He admitted that changes to how Meta filters content would mean “we’re going to catch less bad stuff” without elaborating.
Yet Zuckerberg suggested he would get high-level help for how efforts to democratize platforms like Facebook.
It marked a significant business shift for Zuckerberg, who dined at the president-elect’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida in November and gifted him a pair of Meta Ray-Bans smart glasses. Meta also donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund.
Worthy News learned that other big tech companies, such as Amazon, have donated similar amounts to Trump, who was once suspended from Facebook.
PROMINENT CONSERVATIVE
Meta has also promoted its most prominent conservative, Joel Kaplan, to the company’s top policy job, another move seen as strengthening connections to conservatives.
Zuckerberg explained that his social media company is also adding the auto tycoon John Elkann and the tech investor Charlie Songhurst to its board of directors.
Elkann is the CEO of Exor, a Netherlands-based investment company, and chair of its two auto companies, Stellantis and Ferrari.
Zuckerberg said the executive had “deep experience running large global businesses, and he brings an international perspective to our board.”
Songhurst previously worked at Microsoft and began advising Meta last year on artificial intelligence (AI).
Zuckerberg said they all would help Meta “get rid of a bunch of restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are just out of touch with mainstream discourse.”
He stressed that his firm would “work with President Trump to push back on governments worldwide that are going after American companies and pushing to censor more.”
Copyright 1999-2025 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
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