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This Week's Updates:
Anti-Abortion Organizations Celebrate Trump Victory
Earlier this year, anti-abortion advocates grew frustrated with Donald Trump as he distanced himself from their cause by downplaying his position on abortion and “vowing” to veto a federal ban should it come to his desk. Now, though, the movement and its leaders are celebrating Trump’s victory, characterizing it as a national rejection of reproductive rights.
“With a likely GOP trifecta, we have the opportunity to undo the damage caused by the Biden-Harris admin and then boldly go on the offensive,”said Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. Heartbeat International, an organization which provides services to unregulated pregnancy clinics (UPCs), released a statement declaring that Americans had elected “pro-life majorities with a mandate to act boldly.” In April, CfA urged multiple state Attorneys General to investigate UPCs affiliated with Heartbeat, which may have violated consumer protection laws and misled patients about the privacy of their health information.
Oversight of unregulated entities that purport to provide healthcare services is critical. Though the movement is emboldened by Trump’s win, it is still constrained by existing laws that protect Americans from fraud. This is especially relevant to UPCs, which often rely on deceptive practices to prevent women from accessing abortions. Going forward, CfA will continue to investigate individuals and organizations that break the law and endanger people seeking reproductive care.
Tech CEOs Prepare for a Second Trump Presidency
In October, Donald Trump revealed that he was in communication with Apple CEO Tim Cook, who had called the former president to gauge his stance on antitrust enforcement. At the time, Trump said he “wouldn’t allow” the EU to take action against Apple or other American businesses. In hindsight, other tech leaders were also preparing for a Trump victory; Mark Zuckerberg referred to Trump as a “badass” before renouncing his company’s COVID policies, while Amazon founder Jeff Bezos personally intervened to prevent The Washington Post from endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris. Given these early reactions, it seems likely that tech CEOs will continue down a path of appeasement and flattery, in the hopes of earning Trump’s goodwill and avoiding serious reform.
Down the road, however, the Trump Administration could clash with tech companies over issues like content moderation, which Trump has repeatedlycharacterized as “censorship.” The administration may also weaponize other policy proposals, like Section 230 liability reform, to help favored online platforms get ahead. Vice President-Elect J.D. Vance, for instance, has voiced his support for a Section 230 carve-out that would exempt “new entrants” from liability – giving them a massive advantage over mainstream online spaces like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. In 2023, CfA’s Tech Transparency Project (TTP) published a report explaining how this policy would benefit platforms like Rumble, an “alt-tech” YouTube competitor which Vance is invested in.
Google Avoids Election Misinformation Pitfalls
In 2020 and 2022, TTP investigations revealed that Google was placing scam advertisements in search results for voting information, sending would-be voters to websites that stole their personal information or charged bogus “registration fees.” While Google has struggled to prevent bad actors from taking advantage of its search ads, these voting-related scams are particularly dangerous because they can discourage voters from casting a ballot. The search giant promised to do better in 2024, and outlined the steps it would take to present users with accurate information about voting.
Of course, TTP opted to test Google’s anti-scam safeguards. In early October, researchers set up clean VPNs and used Google to search for voting information in different states. TTP collected a total of 198 advertisements from the first ten pages of search results and found that none led to scams or data-harvesting websites. Meta, meanwhile, approved thousands of pro-Trump scam advertisements in the months leading up to the election.
CfA Executive Director Michelle Kuppersmith said, “This year, Google did the right thing and finally stopped allowing bad actors to mislead American voters using search engine advertisements. It’s time for other platforms to follow suit, and actually enforce their policies against deceptive and illegal activity.”
