Conservative leaders spoke at a game-changing panel about how the movement will take on Big Tech censorship.
Donald Trump, Jr., House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) blasted Bich Tech bias at a Feb 28 CPAC panel “What’s the Right Path Forward on Big Tech?” This panel represented just how rapidly the conservative movement has largely overhauled its approach to the Big Tech issue in recent years. Don Jr. addressed how many in conservative leadership “have not even realized that with our base across the country this is probably a top three issue.”
He commented that previously conservatives had been “trapped in sort of the ‘well it’s free market’” mindset, and now they need to realize “it’s not free market because they're getting so many benefits and protection from liability from the federal government that they cannot discriminate the way they have so flagrantly against conservatives and anyone on our side.”
Here he was referring to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which has provided legal protection for tech companies from the consequences of users’ posts.
While Facebook, under Mark Zuckerberg’s leadership has made some reforms to protect free speech, and was given due credit by McCarthy, Don Jr. warned that the issue of censorship even on that platform is far from over. “Even if [Mark Zuckerberg] agrees, if those 25,000 people below him in charge disagree -- guess what -- they’re gonna do what they want.” He added that “one little subtle manipulation can mean so much that there has to be actual, you know, guidance from the top to make sure that isn’t happening.”
Don Jr. also blasted Big Tech for being “more comfortable working with China to allow them ... [to] do whatever it is that they want with this data.” McCarthy brought up how Google had dropped its former slogan of “don't be evil,” and Don Jr. joked that “a few billion dollars will do that.” Google was forced to scrap its search engine project Dragonfly, which had been tailor made for the Chinese communist government, after outcry from the public and its own workers.
Meanwhile, in America, Don Jr. observed how Big Tech companies “wont give people who want to express their religious freedoms that same platform is truly scary.”
Earlier in the panel he acknowledged how many liberals deny that Big Tech censorship is real. “Well it's not real if you’re a leftist because it doesn’t happen to them,” stated Don Jr. “If you’re pro-life, if you’re pro-2A, if you’re pro-religious liberty, and you say any of those things, you’ve seen it.”
He stressed the fact that Big Tech censorship affects Americans “If they’re doing it to me with a couple million followers, if they’re doing it to the president of the United States with, you know, 15 million followers, what are they doing to your account?”
