By LISA MASCARO and ALI SWENSON (Associated Press)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Robert F. Kennedy Jr. labored to defend himself Thursday towards accusations that he traffics in racist and hateful on-line conspiracy theories, testifying at a House listening to on authorities censorship regardless of requests from exterior teams to disinvite the Democratic presidential candidate after his latest antisemitic remarks.
The Republican-led Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government is amplifying GOP claims that conservatives and others are being unfairly focused by expertise corporations that routinely work with the federal government to attempt to stem the unfold of disinformation on-line. Democrats argued that free speech comes with tasks to not unfold misinformation, notably when it followers violence.
In opening remarks, Kennedy invoked his well-known household’s legacy in decrying the complaints of racism and antisemitism towards him.
“This is an attempt to censor a censorship hearing,” mentioned Kennedy, the son of Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of President John F. Kennedy.
Growing animated at instances, Kennedy defended his statements, which have delved into race, vaccine security and different points, as neither “racist or antisemitic.” He mentioned his household has lengthy believed within the First Amendment proper to free speech.
“The First Amendment was not written for easy speech,” Kennedy mentioned. “It was written for the speech that nobody likes you for.”
Republicans are desirous to elevate Kennedy after he introduced in April he was mounting a long-shot Democratic major problem to President Joe Biden. Kennedy’s presidential marketing campaign chairman, Dennis Kucinich, the previous congressman and previous presidential contender, sat within the entrance row behind him in the course of the more-than-three-hours listening to.
The Big Tech corporations have adamantly denied the GOP assertions and say they implement their guidelines impartially for everybody no matter ideology or political affiliation. And researchers haven’t discovered widespread proof that social media corporations are biased towards conservative information, posts or supplies.
The high Democrat on the House panel, Del. Stacey Plaskett of the Virgin Islands, mentioned the Republican majority was giving a platform to Kennedy and others to advertise conspiracy theories and a rallying cry for “bigotry and hate.”
“This is not the kind of free speech I know,” Plaskett mentioned.
Plaskett warned towards misinformation from Russia and different U.S. adversaries who’ve interfered in American elections and are anticipated to meddle once more within the 2024 election.
Often emotional and heated, Thursday’s listening to got here as subcommittee chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, portrayed what he claimed have been examples of censorship, together with a White House request to Twitter to take away a race-based publish from Kennedy about COVID-19 vaccines.
“It’s why Mr. Kennedy is running for president — it’s to stop, to help us expose and stop what’s going on,” Jordan mentioned.
A watchdog group requested Jordan to drop the invitation to Kennedy after he prompt COVID-19 may have been “ethnically targeted” to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese folks.
In these filmed remarks first revealed by The New York Post, Kennedy mentioned “there is an argument” that COVID-19 “is ethnically targeted” and that it “attacks certain races disproportionately.”
After the video was made public, Kennedy posted on Twitter that his phrases have been twisted and denied ever suggesting that COVID-19 was intentionally engineered to spare Jewish folks. He referred to as for the Post’s article to be retracted.
A clip from the video was aired on the listening to.
Kennedy has a historical past of evaluating vaccines — broadly credited with saving tens of millions of lives — with the genocide of the Holocaust throughout Nazi Germany, feedback for which he has typically apologized.
In heated exchanges, Democrats implored Kennedy and Republicans to think about the fallout from their phrases and actions — and famous that one of many posts Republicans had singled out on the listening to was not eliminated by any censors.
“Hate speech has consequences,” mentioned Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., who made reference to the mass capturing at a Pittsburgh synagogue, amongst others. He referred to as the listening to Orwellian.
Rep. Sylvia Garcia, D-Texas, mentioned she acquired a demise risk after the final listening to of the Weaponization panel.
When Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., learn aloud Kennedy’s postings and questioned his intent, Kennedy interjected that she was “slandering me” and claimed what the congresswoman was saying was a lie.
An group that Kennedy based, Children’s Health Defense, at the moment has a lawsuit pending towards various information organizations, amongst them The Associated Press, accusing them of violating antitrust legal guidelines by taking motion to determine misinformation, together with about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines.
Ahead of the listening to, Jordan mentioned that whereas he disagreed with Kennedy’s remarks, he was not about to drop him from the panel. Speaker Kevin McCarthy took an identical view, saying he didn’t wish to censor Kennedy.
The panel desires to probe the way in which the federal authorities works with expertise corporations to flag postings that comprise false data or downright lies. Hanging over the controversy is a part of federal communications legislation, Section 230, which shields expertise corporations like Twitter and Facebook from legal responsibility over what’s mentioned on their platforms.
Lawmakers on the panel have been additionally listening to testimony from Emma-Jo Morris, journalist at Breitbart News, who has reported extensively on Biden’s son, Hunter Biden; and D. John Sauer, a former Solicitor General in Missouri who’s now a particular Assistant Attorney General on the Louisiana Department of Justice concerned within the lawsuit towards the Biden administration.
Morris tweeted a part of her opening remarks wherein she described an “elaborate censorship conspiracy” that she claimed sought to halt her reporting of Hunter Biden.
A witness referred to as by Democrats, Maya Wiley, the president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, implored the lawmakers to think about the platforms the place Americans share views — but additionally “how deeply vital that they be based in fact, not fiction.”
The U.S. has been hesitant to manage the social media giants, at the same time as exterior teams warn of the rise of hate speech and misinformation that may be erosive to civil society.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com”