Big Tech has censored 2024 Democratic Party presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at least 10 times over a span of three months, but apparently, that is not enough for the left.
Kennedy is no stranger to censorship. Big Tech companies have already interfered in the 2024 presidential election and have censored Kennedy no fewer than 10 times between April and June 2023, according to MRC’s exclusive CensorTrack.org database. YouTube committed the majority of the censorship as it removed no fewer than eight videos from its platform for violating its “Community Guidelines.” In the videos, Kennedy repeatedly spoke on controversial topics like COVID-19 and claimed that the CIA killed his father. Twitter additionally added context or Community Notes to two of Kennedy’s posts.
Kennedy is set to testify at a House Judiciary hearing on censorship Thursday, but he has recently come under fire for comments claiming that COVID-19 was an ethnically targeted bioweapon that does not affect certain Jewish and Chinese people. As a result, Congressional Integrity Project Executive Director Kyle Herrig and over 100 members of Congress have all called for Kennedy to be uninvited from speaking to the committee, arguing that Kennedy has a history of making offensive claims. But House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, in the spirit of free speech, has not caved to the left’s pressure.
“I disagree with everything he said,” McCarthy said about statements made by Kennedy, according to The Associated Press. “The hearing that we have this week is about censorship. I don’t think censoring somebody is actually the answer here. I think if you’re going to look at censorship in America, your first action to censor probably plays into some of the problems we have.”
MRC Free Speech America Vice President Dan Schneider also noted the undeniable ineffectiveness of an anti-free speech approach. “The left uses the same tired tactics to achieve their goals: silence their opposition and defame their opponents. It is so predictable but less and less effective. Americans are waking up to their schemes.”
It seems however that Big Tech platforms, particularly YouTube, don’t care that their anti-American and anti-free speech tactics are getting old and ineffective.
YouTube has censored podcast interview after podcast interview featuring Kennedy since he announced his bid for the Democratic Party presidential nomination in April. The platform censored an interview Kennedy did with world-renowned psychologist and podcaster Dr. Jordan Peterson. The presidential candidate brought up a since retracted Rolling Stone article in which he wrote about “the links between autism and vaccines.” YouTube removed the video for alleged vaccine misinformation.
“Now @YouTube has taken upon itself to actively interfere with a presidential election campaign @RobertKennedyJr,” Peterson tweeted about the incident.
Heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson also had Kennedy on his YouTube podcast, and the platform removed the video. In the interview, Kennedy claimed that the CIA killed his father.
YouTube has even retroactively censored old interviews of Kenedy, including a 2020 interview with comedian Theo Von and a 2021 interview with an independent journalist and YouTuber who goes by Dark Journalist, each removed for “violating Community Guidelines.”
Twitter has also posted Community Notes under a couple of Kennedy’s posts. In one case, Kennedy was actually drawing attention to the fact that ABC had censored portions of an interview he gave them. “47 USC 315 makes it illegal for TV networks to censor Presidential candidates but Thursday, ABC showed its contempt for the law, democracy, and its audience by cutting most of the content of my interview with host Linsey Davis leaving only cherry-picked snippets and a defamatory disclaimer,” Kennedy tweeted.
The Community Note, however, claimed that Kennedy misunderstood the statute he referred to. "47 USC 315’s censorship prohibition applies only when candidates 'use a broadcasting station'. The law explicitly exempts newscasts & news interviews, which are allowed to censor," the note read.
Conservatives are under attack. Contact your representative and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on so-called “hate speech” and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.