Once again, Facebook has been caught hosting a far-left group that harassed a sitting senator at his home.
“Tonight while I was in Missouri, Antifa scumbags came to our place in DC and threatened my wife and newborn daughter, who can’t travel,” Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) tweeted Jan 4. “They screamed threats, vandalized, and tried to pound open our door. Let me be clear: My family & I will not be intimidated by leftwing violence,” he added. Hawley objected to both activists and liberal media downplaying protests such as this “vigil” by Shut Down DC, declaring: “Now ‘vigil’ means screaming threats through bullhorns, vandalizing property, pounding on the doors of homes and terrorizing innocent people and children.”
The Washington Post’s article tried to downplay the incident: “Sen. Josh Hawley says ‘Antifa scumbags’ terrorized his family’s Virginia home. Protesters say they held a peaceful vigil,” assessed a 50-minute video of the protest. The article summarized that the video showed “protesters writing in chalk on the sidewalk, chanting through a megaphone and at one point leaving a copy of the Constitution on Hawley’s doorstep.” The same article quoted Shut Down DC organizer Patrick Young’s claim: “This was not threatening behavior. This is people engaging in democracy and engaging in civil discourse. … This was a pretty tame and peaceful visit to his house.”
In the video, protesters can be seen loudly chanting “Stand up, fight back” as a group approached the door of Hawley’s residence. Later in the video, protestors can be heard shouting “we’ll be back.”
Facebook has a history of allowing far-left activist groups such as Shut Down DC and others to organize on its platform.
Amid the controversial 2020 presidential election, Shut Down DC targeted “at least 27 conservative organizations in the Washington metro area,” The Daily Signal reported. Both Facebook and Twitter allowed the group on the respective platforms, despite the fact that Shut Down DC published a map of conservative organizations in and around DC.
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg explained his concerns about upcoming civil unrest in an early September interview with Axios. He stated, "I think we need to be doing everything that we can to reduce the chances of violence or civil unrest in the wake of this election." Zuckerberg then went on to profess: "We're trying to make sure that we do our part to make sure that none of this is organized on Facebook.”
Despite this commitment, Facebook allowed Shut Down DC and Sunrise DC to organize on the platform to harass U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) at his purported home address about how he intended to vote concerning a replacement for deceased Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the U.S. Supreme Court. The RAIR Foundation USA released an article alleging that Shut Down DC was in the process of “doxxing specific attorneys” and providing supporters “with a unique ‘assigned’ attorney to harass with form letters and pre-scripted phone calls.”
Even after being contacted about what major media described as violent groups such as Rose City Antifa and foreign political interference like far-left Canadian organization Adbusters, Facebook has proven it has not followed through on its commitment to reduce political unrest.
Conservatives are under attack. Contact Facebook's leadership by contacting Facebook headquarters at 1-650-308- 7300 or 1-650-543-4800 and demand that Facebook not permit this type of behavior on its platform. If you have been censored, contact us at the Media Research Center contact form to be included in our database, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.
