Musk’s X influenced by ‘censorship’ group Republicans allege may violate federal law

Billionaire Elon Musk‘s X Corp, the social media company formerly known as Twitter, is crafting its “brand safety” policies for advertising with the help of a group Republicans in Congress say may skirt federal law through alleged censorship.

The House Judiciary Committee in May subpoenaed heads of the World Federation of Advertisers, a marketing association, as well as its Global Alliance for Responsible Media initiative, to obtain records on their “coordinated efforts to demonetize and censor disfavored speech online” that the panel’s Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) said “may violate U.S. antitrust law.” Still, X under Musk, who has proclaimed to be a “free speech absolutist,” is relying on GARM to inform what ads run on its platform, according to announcements by X and Integral Ad Science, a “misinformation” tracker it recently partnered with.

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The ties between GARM and X appear to undercut Musk’s touted desire to make the platform a free speech haven following his October 2022 takeover. Still, Musk has received praise from conservatives for releasing sets of documents, dubbed the “Twitter Files,” to journalists including Matt Taibbi and Lee Fang, that show how Twitter under former CEO Jack Dorsey was in close contact with the U.S. government in recent years on thwarting right-leaning voices online.

“At its best, Elon Musk’s Twitter has supported free speech and free expression, while revealing the extent the company’s previous management deplatformed conservatives and worked with Democrat special interests to censor free speech it didn’t like,” Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), who sits on the Judiciary Committee, told the Washington Examiner. “It will be unfortunate if the future of X is one that deviates from this standard and adopts the culture of ‘content moderation’ that has done so much damage.”

As a way to boost ad revenue amid brands fleeing X, Musk’s company signed an exclusive partnership with Integral Ad Science, a company that classifies “content on behalf of marketers before they run their ads to ensure that the environment is brand safe and brand suitable for the advertiser” and has been partnered with the Global Disinformation Index. A British group with two affiliated American nonprofit groups, GDI has been blacklisting conservative media outlets from ad dollars.

IAS noted in a press release on Aug. 8 that it will “now provide valuable third-party affirmation that brands running ads on X” will only be “appearing in brand safe and suitable environments” in alignment with GARM’s framework. Separately, X announced in its own recent press release that since June it had been “conducting a review process to select third-party partners” to provide pre-bid buying tools, which use machine learning to place ads in alignment with a given company’s standards, aligned with GARM’s framework.

GARM, which says it “unites marketers, media agencies, media platforms, and industry associations to safeguard the potential of digital media by reducing the availability and monetization of harmful content online,” puts forth something it calls a “suitability framework” and a “brand safety floor.” In a four-page document, GARM describes a variety of categories it has allegedly deemed inappropriate for advertisers to support.

While many of the categories pertain to illegal content, others could leave room for ambiguities. One content area, called a “Debated Sensitive Social Issue,” is defined as “insensitive, irresponsible and harmful treatment of debated social issues and related acts that demean a particular group or incite greater conflict,” according to GARM.

Another category, which GARM calls “Hate speech & acts of aggression,” means content that could “promote violence,” but, separately, “incites hatred … or dehumanizes groups or individuals based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, ability, nationality, religion, caste, victims and survivors of violent acts and their kin, immigration status, or serious disease sufferers.”

GARM’s framework is aimed at “demonetizing misinformation” and was developed “in coordination with the European Commission,” the independent executive arm of the European Union, according to a June 2022 WFA report. The World Economic Forum, an international NGO headed by German economist Klaus Schwab, partnered with GARM in 2019 to address “harmful and misleading media while protecting consumers and brands,” a press release shows.

“The problem is the left-wing censorship cartel is getting its claws into Twitter,” Mike Davis, president of the Internet Accountability Project, a right-leaning watchdog “fighting to rein in Big Tech,” told the Washington Examiner. “This is how the Left is able to crush free speech for conservatives in America.”

(AP Photo/John Raoux)

In his May GARM subpoena, Jordan mentioned how the initiative’s co-founder, Robert Rakowitz, provided the Judiciary Committee with an April statement declaring that WFA and GARM “welcome the opportunity to provide information to the committee and are committed to cooperating” with the investigation.

Moreover, Rakowitz purportedly alluded to a WFA-developed proposal “around April 2019 that led to the creation of GARM,” despite GARM apparently not providing these records to the GOP-led panel, the committee said.

“On May 4, 2023, the committee spoke with you, and you said that while GARM has initiated a document preservation hold, you were still ‘at the scoping phase’ and in the process of understanding where responsive documents are located,” Jordan wrote in his subpoena, which followed his March request for “documents and communications related to how GARM and WFA act to demonetize and eliminate disfavored content online,” among other information.

The World Federation of Advertisers did not reply to a request for comment. The Washington Examiner reached out over email to X’s press line, which automatically replies, “We’ll get back to you soon.”

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“Free expression is fundamental to a healthy functioning global society — and if it’s taken away, it’s almost impossible to get back,” Musk said in July upon announcing X’s lawsuit accusing the British group Center for Countering Digital Hate of putting forth “false” claims after it alleged hate speech spiked on X after Musk’s October takeover.

“That’s why we will continue to stand up for people’s rights, including the over half a billion of you who turn to our platform continually,” the X owner added.