In July of 2021, Meta’s head of global affairs, Nick Clegg, emailedBrian Rice, who was on the Public Policy team, asking why the company had removed from Facebook, rather than demoted or flagged, claims that COVID-19 was “man-made.” Rice responded, “Because we were under pressure from the [Biden] administration and others to do more and it was part of the ‘more’ package.” He concluded his reply to Clegg with an acknowledgment of error: “We shouldn’t have done it.”
These emails make clear that the company had removed posts discussing the lab leak theory not pursuant to their own judgment and policies, but because the Biden administration pressured them to do so. This is a remarkable set of facts, given that in the two years that have passed since that exchange, the lab leak theory has gained credibility in mainstream circles, including within the Biden administration. In direct opposition to their 2021 edicts calling it “misinformation,” the Biden administration recently halted funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology over concerns that the COVID-19 virus originated there.
