Trump Wrongly Tweets Social Media is Burying FBI Letter
Sunday Morning Donald Trump sent out a tweet implying that major social media sites, such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter, are trying to suppress information regarding a letter FBI Directory James Comey sent to congress about emails found on an device belonging to top Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her soon-to-be ex husband Anthony Weiner.
Wow, Twitter, Google and Facebook are burying the FBI criminal investigation of Clinton. Very dishonest media!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 30, 2016
Reality
Donald Trump received this information in an article from the conspiracy theory website Zero Hedge which is known to produce disingenuous content.
For their only evidence they showed screen grabs of we assume their own social media feeds.
However all social media sites have their own independent algorithms, and for this claim to be true Trump and his unreliable source would need to provide evidence of a level of collusion between competing social media companies.
There are a few things to consider when looking at trending topics. First, they are all algorithm-based, meaning some computer code was written to determine what topics are most important, and second, part of that algorithm factors in the things that you like.
But a simple review of each social media site shows, in most cases, the James Comey letter is indeed in the top trending stories.
Trump has a social media team who should be able to debunk this for him.
Google Trend searches for “Clinton FBI” and “FBI investigation Clinton” both showed a 100% interest value at the time of Trump’s tweet.
And news about James Comey’s letter was the top story to a logged out user.
Top story on Facebook.
Top of the Twitter news for a logged out user.
