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Trump: Twitter, Facebook, Google are colluding to silence conservatives

The president wants to "do something" about social media.

Marrian Zhou Staff Reporter
Marrian Zhou is a Beijing-born Californian living in New York City. She joined CNET as a staff reporter upon graduation from Columbia Journalism School. When Marrian is not reporting, she is probably binge watching, playing saxophone or eating hot pot.
Marrian Zhou
2 min read
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President Donald Trump said "we have to do something" about social media companies. 

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President Donald Trump is again alleging that social media companies are biased against conservatives.

During a joint press conference with Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro on Tuesday, Trump said "we have to do something" about social media companies discriminating against conservatives on their platforms. 

"Something is happening with those groups of folks that are running Facebook , Google and Twitter ," said Trump. "I do think we have to get to the bottom of it ... It's collusive and it's very, very fair to say that we have to do something about it."

Trump's comments came after he was asked whether he'd consider laws that made social media platforms liable for content posted on their sites and his support for a $250 million lawsuit against Twitter over allegations of "shadow banning" conservatives.

"It's different from what it used to be. Things are happening, names are taken off, people aren't getting through," said Trump. "It seems to be if they're conservative, if they're Republicans, if they're in a certain group, there's discrimination, big discrimination."

Neither the White House nor Facebook nor Google immediately responded to requests for comment. Twitter declined to comment. 

This isn't Trump's first time alleging that social media companies are silencing conservative voices on their platforms. In August, Trump took to Twitter to accuse social media companies of "totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices." His tweets also came amid more general concerns among some conservatives about perceived bias on the part of social media and tech companies.

On Tuesday, Facebook apologized to Trump's social media director, Dan Scavino, for temporarily blocking some contents on his account on Monday, according to CNN Business. Facebook's artificial intelligence system reportedly mistook Scavino for a bot.