Independent Senator Bernie Sanders and 12 Democratic members of Congress on Thursday asked Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to explain the alleged unequal treatment by his main platforms (Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp) of the campaigns of Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and far-right Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who are facing off Sunday in the second round of Brazil’s presidential election. The final stretch of the campaign, tense amid polls predicting a technical tie, has been marked by alleged technical errors at Meta that have generally harmed the leftist leader.
The letter from Sanders and other lawmakers to Zuckerberg expresses “deep concern” over “credible reports of Meta platforms restricting or suppressing content associated with the Lula campaign while amplifying or recommending content associated with the Bolsonaro campaign, thereby creating starkly unequal conditions in the digital environment.”
The authors stress that favoring one candidate over another, whether deliberately or inadvertently, is “unacceptable.”
Sanders and the others want to know whether those actions are part of a Trumpist strategy of interference in Latin America. They ask the company to disclose whether it had contacts with members of his administration about Brazil’s judiciary, proposals to regulate platforms, the presidential contest or U.S. policy toward Brazil. If so, they request that Meta produce records of meetings, phone calls, emails, text messages or letters.
The U.S. lawmakers’ request follows complaints from Lula’s campaign that the president’s profiles had lost reach, that searches about Lula also suggested content about Flávio Bolsonaro but not vice versa, and that Meta’s artificial intelligence (AI) refused to generate images supporting the progressive candidate while posing no problem creating posters praising his rival. Although the company argued these were technical glitches, that there was no intent to interfere in the election and that it has taken steps to correct the errors, the controversy around those incidents has escalated over the last few days. Brazil’s Electoral Court has demanded robust measures from Meta to ensure the two candidates are treated equally. Lula’s team has reported the case to the United Nations and to the Organization of American States (OAS).
Sanders himself had criticized Meta and “the billionaire ownership of the media” days earlier, comparing the moves that hurt Lula to other actions, such as when the company shut down the No Kings account at the height of those protests or when TikTok blocked distribution of a documentary criticizing Elon Musk. “Fight back. Defeat the oligarchy. Preserve democracy,” the veteran politician said.
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