Dear MoveOn member,
I'll cut to the chase: I'm pissed off—and not just because the Republican National Convention is this week.
According to a shocking report, nearly half of all top-performing Facebook posts that mention voting by mail are false or misleading.1
These lies are being spread by right-wing Trump-supporting groups at a time when millions of voters are planning to cast mail-in ballots, and they are specifically targeting people likely to vote for Democrats.2 And Trump is doing nothing to stop them: As the Republican National Convention kicked off yesterday, he spent an entire 20-minute speech repeating many of these lies.
Let's call these lies what they are: voter suppression—and they have the potential to hand Trump a second term.
That's why I'm urgently writing to you today to tell you about MoveOn's efforts to combat these lies, save our elections, and make sure that every vote is counted.
MoveOn has hired a team of digital detectives who are tracking right-wing disinformation networks online, following the threads to their source, and exposing their impact. Most importantly, MoveOn's digital sleuths are pressuring social media platforms like Facebook to take down these posts.
And MoveOn's video team is creating ads that will provide voters the information they need to properly and safely vote this year. MoveOn has big plans to target these ads to young voters, voters of color, and first-time voters in 10 critical battleground states that will decide control of the White House and Senate.
But MoveOn needs your help to ensure these efforts are as big and bold as possible all the way through Election Day.
Will you chip in $3 a week to help MoveOn take down right-wing lies and to help provide voters with the information that they need to safely and securely cast their ballots? (MoveOn will bill your weekly donation to your credit card once a month starting today and will contact you shortly after the election to see if you want to modify or cancel your weekly donation.)
No, I'm sorry, I can't chip in weekly.
John, investigators say that the right wing is spreading "false claims, including conspiracy theories about stolen elections or outright misrepresentations about voting by mail" on Facebook, reaching and misinforming millions of voters.3
So, what's Facebook doing to stop these lies and protect our democratic process? Barely lifting a finger.
In fact, leaked internal materials show that Facebook purposely "relaxed its rules so that conservative pages ... were not penalized for violations of the company's misinformation policies."4
Despicable.
Facebook even gave preferential treatment to Breitbart and Charlie Kirk, the racist right-winger who spoke at the Republican National Convention last night and spent his time spewing even more lies.5
We simply MUST combat these lies. Because if we don't, they could spread to millions of voters in critical battleground states, confuse voters, depress turnout, and potentially even lead to Trump's re-election.
Will you chip in $3 a week to fuel MoveOn's campaign to take down right-wing lies on social media in the lead up to Election Day? (MoveOn will bill your weekly donation to your credit card once a month starting today and will contact you shortly after the election to see if you want to modify or cancel your weekly donation.)
No, I'm sorry, I can't chip in weekly.
It won't be enough to simply take down these lies intended to suppress the vote. We have a lot of work to do to ensure every single voter has what they need to vote safely and securely this November.
One poll found that 50% of young voters—a crucial Democratic constituency—say they don't have the resources or knowledge they need to vote by mail in November.6
That's why MoveOn is creating videos on the voting process that will provide key voters—including young voters, voters of color, and first-time voters—in swing states the information they need to cast their ballots.
MoveOn is hard at work creating video ads that will show voters how to
I'll be frank: Getting this critical information out to voters in battleground states isn't cheap.
So, will you chip in $3 a week to fund these critical ads and ensure every voter has the information they need to safely vote this November? (MoveOn will bill your weekly donation to your credit card once a month starting today and will contact you shortly after the election to see if you want to modify or cancel your weekly donation.)
No, I'm sorry, I can't chip in weekly.
Thanks for all you do.
–Robert Reich
Sources:
1. "'Outright Lies': Voting Misinformation Flourishes on Facebook," ProPublica, July 16, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/142120?t=8&akid=272211%2E40999114%2EQ5vKzi
2. "Disinformation campaign stokes fears about mail voting, using LeBron James image and boosted by Trump-aligned group," The Washington Post, August 20, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/142121?t=10&akid=272211%2E40999114%2EQ5vKzi
3. "Sensitive to claims of bias, Facebook relaxed misinformation rules for conservative pages," NBC News, August 7, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/142122?t=12&akid=272211%2E40999114%2EQ5vKzi
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. "Poll: More Than Half Of Young People Lack Resources To Vote By Mail," NPR, July 30, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/141675?t=14&akid=272211%2E40999114%2EQ5vKzi
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