Independent U.S. presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr, along with a super PAC supporting him, filed a lawsuit on Monday against Facebook parent Meta Platforms (META.O), alleging interference in the election after the tech giant blocked a political advertisement.
Kennedy and the American Values 2024 super PAC, which funded the advertisement—a 30-minute video about Kennedy’s life—filed the lawsuit in federal court in San Francisco. They claim that Meta censored the video by removing it and preventing users on its platforms from watching, sharing, or posting a link to it.
Meta, the owner of Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp platforms, is accused of censoring the video “within minutes” of its release on May 3, according to the lawsuit. Despite Meta’s statement on May 5 that the video was no longer being censored, the lawsuit alleges that it is still being blocked for users.
The lawsuit states, “Defendants seem to believe that they can with legal impunity issue threats to their users and deploy their vast power of censorship, account-suspension, and deplatforming in order to favor or target the presidential candidate of their choice.”
No comment on lawsuit
Meta declined to comment on the lawsuit but previously stated that the link was mistakenly blocked and was quickly restored once the issue was discovered.
After the ad was blocked, Kennedy and numerous others criticized what they viewed as an injustice on social media. Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of social media platform X, reposted the video on X, stating it was “worth watching.”
The 30-minute video, titled “Who Is Bobby Kennedy” and narrated by actor Woody Harrelson, delves into Kennedy’s life, his famous family, and the media’s perception of him. It highlights Kennedy’s background as an environmental lawyer and his concerns regarding a “rushed” coronavirus vaccine and the effectiveness of pandemic-era lockdowns.
Kennedy, who has previously been banned from Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O) YouTube and Meta’s Instagram for spreading misinformation about vaccines and the COVID-19 pandemic, rejects the anti-vaccine label, arguing that vaccines should undergo more rigorous testing.
A Facebook post from Kennedy sharing the video has approximately 10,000 “likes,” while the same post on social media platform X has around 84,000 “likes.”
Kennedy, challenging Republican former President Donald Trump and Democratic President Joe Biden for the White House in November, could potentially secure 8% of voters nationwide, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in March.
