Two campaign staffers for Vice President Kamala Harris were involved in efforts to censor Americans for spreading “misinformation” about COVID-19 while they worked in the Biden-Harris White House.
Then-senior administration officials Rob Flaherty and Aisha Shah were implicated in government efforts to censor Americans in legal documents related to the case of Mursi v. Missouri, which alleged the federal government violated the First Amendment by pressuring social media companies to censor content about the pandemic and other hot topics. Flaherty He is currently the Deputy Election Chief. Shah According to their respective LinkedIn profiles, they are directors of digital partnerships.
According to their profiles, Flaherty served as director and assistant for digital strategy to President Joe Biden, while Shah served as deputy director for partnerships. (Related article: DHS-affiliated “misinformation” researcher claims to have advised and influenced Twitter's censorship practices)
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Flaherty participated in meetings with officials from Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. According to He further challenged a motion for a preliminary injunction in the Murthy v. Missouri case in July 2023. He also engaged in email correspondence with social media platforms urging them to take a more aggressive stance against COVID-19 “misinformation” and content that could cause users to hesitate to get the coronavirus vaccine.
“As we were on the phone, the top post today about the vaccine is Tucker Carlson saying the vaccine doesn't work. Yesterday it was Tomi Lehren saying she won't take the vaccine,” one post read. Email “This is exactly why I would like to know what 'cutting' actually means. If 'cutting' means 'allowing Tucker Carlson to tell the most reluctant audience members that vaccines don't work'…I'm not sure that's a cut!” Flaherty wrote to Facebook executives in April 2021.
Flaherty also called on Twitter to remove a parody account linked to the president's granddaughter, Finnegan Biden, writing to the company that “I cannot emphasize enough the extent to which this issue needs to be resolved immediately,” the motion states.
Flaherty then testified Trump defended his actions before the House Judiciary Committee in May, saying the pandemic was still raging at the time, and noted that “misinformation” poses a public health challenge by increasing vaccine hesitancy, and that social media companies ultimately decide what content is allowed on their platforms. (Related: Mark Zuckerberg's belated admission of government censorship may ignite First Amendment claims)
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In response to a subpoena from a third party, Facebook and its parent company, Meta, identified Shah as a White House official who had contacted the social media company about “misinformation, disinformation and censorship.” According to Another legal claim is based on Murthy v. Missouri.
The Supreme Court ultimately Double-sided The Biden administration ruled that the plaintiffs in Mursi v. Missouri lacked standing to sue. Justice Samuel Alito wrote a dissenting opinion in the case, saying the Supreme Court's decision established a precedent that “allows the successful enforcement campaign in this case to serve as an attractive model for future government officials wishing to control what citizens say, hear, and think.”
In a letter Monday to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the Biden administration “repeatedly pressured” Facebook to censor content that otherwise would not have been restricted, and he regretted caving to that pressure.
Harris' campaign, Flaherty, Shah and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
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