A
question
about
whether
Republican
vice
presidential
candidate
Sen.
JD
Vance
(R-OH)
would
challenge
the
2024
election
results
quickly
devolved
into
a
fight
about
censorship
and
Big
Tech
during
the
debate
with
Democratic
candidate
Gov.
Tim
Walz
(D-MN).
“You
have
said
you
would
not
have
certified
the
last
presidential
election,
and
would
have
asked
the
states
to
submit
alternative
electors.
That
has
been
called
unconstitutional
and
illegal,”
moderator
Norah
O’Donnell
asked
Vance.
“Would
you
again
seek
to
challenge
this
year’s
election
results,
even
if
every
governor
certifies
the
results?”
Vance
said
that
instead
of
the
threats
to
democracy
decried
by
Democrats,
what’s
really
worrying
is
the
threat
of
“big
technology
companies
silencing
their
fellow
citizens.”
Vance
says
Harris
would
like
to
“censor
people
who
engage
in
misinformation,”
and
that’s
“a
much
bigger
threat
to
democracy
than
anything
we’ve
seen”
in
the
last
four
or
40
years.
“Kamala
Harris
is
engaged
in
censorship
at
an
industrial
scale,”
Vance
said,
adding
that’s
a
much
larger
threat
than
former
President
Donald
Trump
telling
people
to
protest
“peacefully”
on
January
6th
at
the
US
Capitol
insurrection.
Vance
compared
Trump’s
refusal
to
believe
the
results
of
the
2020
election
to
Democrats’
concerns
about
Russian
foreign
interference
in
the
2016
election,
where
they
pointed
to
foreign
agents’
purchasing
of
Facebook
ads
as
contributing
to
Hillary
Clinton’s
loss
to
Trump.
(A
Republican-led
Senate
committee
concluded
in
2020
that
Russia
did
seek
to
interfere
in
the
2016
election
to
benefit
Trump’s
candidacy.)
“January
6th
was
not
Facebook
ads,”
Walz
retorted,
calling
Vance’s
version
of
events
“revisionist
history.”
“January
6th
was
not
Facebook
ads”
Vance
was
apparently
alluding
to
the
events
behind
Murthy
v.
Missouri,
a
Supreme
Court
case
decided
earlier
this
year.
The
case
covered
accusations
that
the
Biden
administration
coerced
tech
platforms
to
engage
in
censorship.
Justices
ruled
in
the
Biden
administration’s
favor
based
on
standing,
but
they
also
cast
doubt
on
whether
there
was
a
meaningful
connection
between
government
outreach
to
platforms
like
Facebook
and
those
platforms’
later
moderation
decisions.
Walz
attempted
to
redirect
the
debate
back
to
the
original
question.
“Did
he
lose
the
2020
election?”
he
asked
Vance.
“Tim,
I’m
focused
on
the
future,”
Vance
replied.
“Did
Kamala
Harris
censor
Americans
from
speaking
their
mind
in
the
wake
of
the
2020
Covid
situation?”
“That
is
a
damning
non-answer,”
Walz
said.
“It’s
a
damning
non-answer
for
you
not
to
talk
about
censorship,”
Vance
retorted.
At
another
point,
Vance
accused
Harris
of
wanting
to
“use
the
power
of
government
and
Big
Tech
to
silence
people
from
speaking
their
minds.”
Trump
himself
recently
suggested
that
some
people
“should
be
put
in
jail
the
way
they
talk
about
our
judges
and
our
justices,”
referring
to
criticism
of
the
Supreme
Court.
Walz
responded
to
Vance
with
the
widely
used
but
misleading
claim
that
“shouting
fire
in
a
crowded
theatre”
is
a
Supreme
Court
test
for
unprotected
speech.
Vance
didn’t
dispute
the
premise,
but
he
claimed
“you
guys
wanted
to
kick
people
off
of
Facebook
for
saying
that
toddlers
shouldn’t
wear
masks.
That’s
not
fire
in
a
crowded
theatre.
That
is
criticizing
the
policies
of
the
government,
which
is
the
right
of
every
American.”
“I
don’t
run
Facebook,”
Walz
said.
“This
is
not
a
debate,
it’s
not
anything
anywhere
other
than
in
Donald
Trump’s
world.”
(Originally posted by Lauren Feiner)
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