Connect the Dots 101

The Washington Post and ProPublica examined millions of posts in Facebook groups to discover the extent of election deligitimatization posts ahead of Jan. 6, 2021. The social media company has downplayed its role in fueling the Jan. 6 violence.
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Facebook groups swelled with at least 650,000 posts attacking the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s victory between Election Day and the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol, with many calling for executions or other political violence, an investigation by ProPublica and The Washington Post has found.

The barrage — averaging at least 10,000 posts a day, a scale not reported previously — turned the groups into incubators for the baseless claims supporters of President Donald Trump voiced as they stormed the Capitol, demanding he get a second term. Many posts portrayed Biden’s election as the result of widespread fraud that required extraordinary action — including the use of force — to prevent the nation from falling into the hands of traitors.

“LOOKS LIKE CIVIL WAR is BECOMING INEVITABLE !!!” read a post a month before the Capitol assault. “WE CANNOT ALLOW FRAUDULENT ELECTIONS TO STAND ! SILENT NO MORE MAJORITY MUST RISE UP NOW AND DEMAND BATTLEGROUND STATES NOT TO CERTIFY FRAUDULENT ELECTIONS NOW !”

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The task force removed hundreds of groups with violent or hateful content in the months before Nov. 3, 2020, according to the ProPublica-Post investigation.

Yet shortly after the vote, Facebook dissolved the task force and rolled back other intensive enforcement measures.

The results of that decision were clear in the data ProPublica and The Post examined: During the nine increasingly tense weeks that led up to Jan. 6, the groups were inundated with posts attacking the legitimacy of Biden’s election, while the pace of removals noticeably slowed.

www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/01/04/facebook-election-misinformation-capitol-riot/