Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas used the short time allotted to question Mark Zuckerberg to grill the Facebook CEO about the social media behemoth shuttering a “Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day” page. The rare joint Senate committees hearing was called to discuss the Cambridge Analytica data breach affecting 87 million people, mostly Americans.
Cruz is facing a formidable Democratic opponent: U.S. Representative Beto O’Rourke, who is hauling in millions of dollars in donations – a shocking surprise for a Democrat running in Texas.
It’s unclear if Facebook did shutter that page, but “Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day,” created by Mike Huckabee, was nearly six years ago, in August of 2012.
Americans, Cruz claimed for the cameras. “are increasingly concerned that Facebook and other tech companies, are engaged in a pervasive pattern of bias and political censorship.”
After referring to an unproven story about Facebook “routinely suppressing conservative stories from trending news,” Cruz went on to claim Facebook had suppressed stories about CPAC, Mitt Romney, the Lois Lerner IRS “scandal,” and Glenn Beck.
“In addition to that, Facebook has initially shut down the Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day page,” Cruz complained, before citing other actions he thinks Facebook has taken against conservatives.
He then went on to challenge Zuckerberg, asking if Facebook has ever taken down pages from Planned Parenthood or MoveOn.org.
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