White House rallies conservatives to social media summit, snubs Facebook, Twitter, Google
WASHINGTON (Sinclair Broadcast Group) — The White House social media summit is scheduled to take place Thursday afternoon and representatives from the largest platforms in the industry are not expected to attend.
Facebook confirmed that they did not receive an invitation. Twitter and Google's Alphabet, which owns YouTube, also did not receive invitations, according to reports. Company representatives would not provide comment.
With the big three social media players sidelined from the event, it has left a lot of open space for other voices.
Based on the confirmed list of attendees, the summit will almost certainly focus on allegations of censorship and anti-conservative political bias by platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
Prager U, a conservative political nonprofit that produces short videos, confirmed that they will be sending representatives to the White House. Prager U filed a lawsuit against YouTube for alleged censorship and discrimination based on the organization's political viewpoint. YouTube has placed more than 100 PragerU videos on its restricted list, arguing the content violates its terms of service.
Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe was also invited to the summit. O'Keefe is known for using undercover interview tactics to expose alleged corruption on the left. He recently released video of a Google representative suggesting the company was manipulating its algorithms to hurt Trump's chances of being reelected.
The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, confirmed Tuesday that it would be sending several representatives to the White House. In a press release, Robert Bluey, vice president of communications and executive editor of The Daily Signal welcomed the opportunity to tackle "important questions about social media," such as whether the government should weigh in with "heavy-handed" regulations.
The Media Research Center will be attending the summit. The MRC is a media bias watchdog with a self-described mission to "expose and neutralize the propaganda arm of the Left: the national news media."
Turning Point USA, a conservative youth organization was also reportedly invited to attend the White House summit.
Ben Garrison a controversial cartoonist was invited and then disinvited to the summit. The White House rescinded the invitation following criticism that his cartoons were anti-Semitic. In a statement, Garrison defended his cartoon and agreed that his presence the summit "would be a media distraction from the President's message."
Conservatives who claim left-leaning social media platforms have silenced their voices have found a champion in the Trump White House.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to take legal and regulatory actions against internet platforms. In a June interview with Fox Business, he openly threatened to sue Facebook and Google. Trump, citing the Project Veritas video, claimed that Google was "totally biased" and was trying to "rig" the 2020 presidential election. He further claimed, without evidence, that Twitter was actively stopping people from following him because he is a Republican.
In recent months both the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission have opened investigations into Google and Facebook, respectively.
The White House also launched an online reporting tool in May that allows social media users to report incidents of alleged political bias.
As of Wednesday afternoon, the White House was still shoring up its list of guests for the social media summit.
