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Facebook's Zuckerberg called Pelosi after altered video, but she hasn't responded

The speaker of the House reportedly isn't eager to hear what the social network's CEO has to say.

Queenie Wong Former Senior Writer
Queenie Wong was a senior writer for CNET News, focusing on social media companies including Facebook's parent company Meta, Twitter and TikTok. Before joining CNET, she worked for The Mercury News in San Jose and the Statesman Journal in Salem, Oregon. A native of Southern California, she took her first journalism class in middle school.
Expertise I've been writing about social media since 2015 but have previously covered politics, crime and education. I also have a degree in studio art. Credentials
  • 2022 Eddie award for consumer analysis
Queenie Wong
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Would you take a call from this man? Nancy Pelosi apparently didn't.

James Martin/CNET

Silence might speak louder than words for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has criticized Facebook for not removing a video that was altered to make her seem drunk. 

On Tuesday, The Washington Post reported that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg  called Pelosi to talk about how the company deals with misinformation but that she wasn't "eager" to hear his explanation and didn't call back. Their staff members have been in touch, though, according to the Post, which cited unnamed people familiar with the matter. 

Tensions between the California Democrat and the world's largest social network have escalated after Facebook decided to leave up the doctored Pelosi clip. Facebook doesn't label the video itself as manipulated, but on desktop computers it shows articles from fact-checkers alongside the clip, and it reduced the video's reach on NewsFeed. Twitter also left up the video. Google-owned YouTube took it down. 

One version of the video, posted by the group Politics WatchDog, got nearly 3 million views, but it's no longer available. The group claimed last week that Facebook took it down, but the social network said it didn't. Pelosi said in May that Facebook's refusal to remove the altered video showed that the company's leaders were "willing enablers" of Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.

Pelosi didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. Facebook declined to comment or confirm the Post's report. 

On Thursday, the House Intelligence Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing on manipulated media and "deepfakes," a technique that uses AI to create videos of people doing or saying something they didn't.