DOJ Going After Anti-Trump Facebook Groups, Activists

Lawyers working for the Trump administration filed three search warrants demanding private account information for thousands of Facebook users, including "anti-administration activists who have spoken out at organized events, and who are generally very critical of this administration's policies," according to CNN. One of the warrants being considered by the Department of Justice relates to the disruptj20 Facebook page, a protest held on President Donald Trump’s Inauguration Day. The search warrant would identify all the people who interacted with the Facebook page in any way, even just leaving a comment or liking a post.

"What is particularly chilling about these warrants is that anti-administration political activists are going to have their political associations and views scrutinized by the very administration they are protesting," American Civil Liberties Union attorney Scott Michelman told CNN.

The ACLU is representing three of the DisruptJ20 activists, including Lacy MacAuley and Legba Carrefour, in an attempt to challenge the warrants. The ACLU claims the warrants are so broad they violate the constitutional right to freedom of speech, plus the Fourth Amendment protecting Americans from “unreasonable searches and seizures.” CNN reported targeted activist Emmelia Talarico said these warrants could give government officials access to her personal passwords, security questions and answers and credit card information, in addition to private guest lists for like-minded political events.

A Facebook spokesperson told Gizmodo the tech company had to fight in court for the right to even notify these individuals they are under investigation. Evidently, Facebook’s efforts to help users didn’t go over well with the White House. Trump slammed Facebook on Twitter earlier this week, calling it “anti-Trump” and accusing Facebook of scheming with the “fake news” media industry.

Reuters reported Facebook will soon give congressional investigators information about 3,000 political ads, which could have been purchased by Russians to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential elections. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg responded to Trump’s accusation in a Facebook post, claiming the platform is politically neutral.

However, even if Facebook didn't favor any particular party, a study of the platform's broader ecosystem by the Columbia Journalism Review proved the virality of election coverage did have one overarching theme: Extreme polarization. The combination of political campaigns and social media algorithms tends to favor outrageous misinformation over balanced news coverage.

It appears Facebook played a nuanced role, rather than a strictly neutral one, in the 2016 election. Anti-Trump activists weren’t the only ones organizing protests on Facebook. Facebook’s chief security officer, Alex Stamos, wrote at least 470 fake accounts involved with online political activity were “likely operated out of Russia.” The Daily Beast reported some of those secretly Russian accounts helped organize or promote around 17 Trump rallies during the election season, mostly in Florida.

This recent move by the DOJ to identify Facebook accounts connected to “anti-administration” activism almost mirrors congressional efforts to unveil these fake accounts. Only time will tell if the ACLU will be able to keep American activists from getting entangled with the rivalry between Facebook and the Trump administration.