Capehart: Biden Tech Censorship Efforts ‘Responsible’ and Court Ruling Against Them ‘from the Fever Swamps’

On Friday’s “PBS NewsHour,” MSNBC host and Washington Post Associate Editor Jonathan Capehart defended the Biden administration’s social media censorship efforts that were rebuked in court by arguing that “A responsible, functioning government” would have told tech platforms, “We understand your First Amendment rights, but we’re trying to save people’s lives.” And lamented that “arguments from the fever swamps have made their way into judicial decisions and are now preventing the administration from combating things that are doing real harm to the American people.”

Capehart said, “This decision boggles the mind. You have an administration that is in the middle of a pandemic. The Biden administration comes in, in the middle of a pandemic, with disinformation, misinformation. They’re literally trying to save people’s lives and see that all that misinformation and disinformation is happening on social media platforms. A responsible, functioning government would go to those social media companies and say, hey, could we have a conversation about this? We understand your First Amendment rights, but we’re trying to save people’s lives.”

He continued, “I don’t understand how the arguments from the fever swamps have made their way into judicial decisions and are now preventing the administration from combating things that are doing real harm to the American people. And now — and I’m glad you made the link to Mr. Taranto, the guy who was arrested outside of the Obama’s homes — home with ammunition and guns and a machete. And who’s to say, had he not been caught, that he wouldn’t have acted on that information?”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett