--- title: Ted Cruz Asks Mark Zuckerberg About Facebook Political Bias description: For the better part of its first two hours, Mark Zuckerberg's testimony before Congress on Tuesday was a tedious affair. canonical: https://time.com/5235461/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-ted-cruz/ author: Nash Jenkins article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-04-10T22:10:35.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-12T09:05:44.889Z article:section: Politics og:title: The Mark Zuckerberg vs. Ted Cruz Showdown Was the Most Explosive Part of Today's Facebook Testimony og:description: For the better part of its first two hours, Mark Zuckerberg's testimony before Congress on Tuesday was a tedious affair. og:url: https://time.com/5235461/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-ted-cruz/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteca3c6d87b6039d3/69892d4dbc6cfc3cfc3e59ed/mark-zuckerberg-ted-cruz.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5568 og:image:height: 3132 og:image:alt: Mark Zuckerberg Ted Cruz og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Mark Zuckerberg vs. Ted Cruz Showdown Was the Most Explosive Part of Today's Facebook Testimony twitter:description: For the better part of its first two hours, Mark Zuckerberg's testimony before Congress on Tuesday was a tedious affair. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blteca3c6d87b6039d3/69892d4dbc6cfc3cfc3e59ed/mark-zuckerberg-ted-cruz.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Mark Zuckerberg vs. Ted Cruz Showdown Was the Most Explosive Part of Today's Facebook Testimony > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=08424fc8-a6c0-438a-9c5a-dee3534d6d9f&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Ted Cruz Questions Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg About Political Censorship [Watch (HLS stream): Ted Cruz Questions Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg About Political Censorship](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/kd1xCnYF.m3u8) (4:15)  _Published 2018-04-10. Ted Cruz Questions Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg About Political Censorship_ by [Nash Jenkins](https://time.com/author/p-nash-jenkins/) ## Nash Jenkins Apr 10, 2018 10:10 PM UTC Ted Cruz Questions Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg About Political Censorship by [Nash Jenkins](https://time.com/author/p-nash-jenkins/) ## Nash Jenkins Apr 10, 2018 10:10 PM UTC For the better part of its first two hours, Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony before Congress on Tuesday was a tedious affair. The problem, it seemed, were the senators questioning him. Rarely before has the senescence of this Senate — which, with an average age of 63, is the [oldest](https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/how-the-oldest-senate-ever-is-taking-a-toll-on-the-operations-of-washington/2017/12/16/349f27b8-e1b3-11e7-89e8-edec16379010%5Fstory.html?utm%5Fterm=.560797646bcc) in history — been so apparent. Their queries were clumsy, demonstrating limited fluency in the workings of social media and its jargon. When Zuckerberg’s replies were evasive, as they sometimes were, many of these lawmakers seemed ill-equipped to push back. At one point, Sen. Orrin Hatch, the 84-year-old Utah Republican set to retire this year, asked Zuckerberg how Facebook plans to stay free for its users. “Senator, we run ads,” Zuckerberg said flatly. But then Ted Cruz chimed in. The 47-year-old Cruz, who has been known since his Princeton debate team days as a gleefully caustic interlocutor, clearly arrived in the meeting chamber in the Hart Senate Office Building with a plan of attack. Only before the first five-minute bathroom break of Zuckerberg’s lengthy hearing did he choose to execute it. And when he did, for a few moments, Zuckerberg appeared on edge. “Does Facebook consider itself a neutral public forum?” Cruz asked Zuckerberg innocently. “Senator, we consider ourselves to be a platform for ideas,” Zuckerberg replied. It was a canned marketing point, and Cruz — with an air that suggested he knew Zuckerberg had walked into his trap — retorted with a more pointed query. “Are you a First Amendment speaker expressing your views or are you a neutral public forum allowing everyone to speak?” Cruz demanded. It’s a worthwhile question in the second decade of the twenty-first century, as the internet continues to grow from a mere communications system to a plane on which we conduct our everyday lives, demanding new considerations of speech rights and the privatization of public space. But it turned out that all Cruz wanted to do was grind an old axe: his belief that Facebook has demonstrated a “pervasive pattern of political bias” in its monitoring and regulation of the content shared to its platform. He proceeded to rattle off a laundry list of examples: A “Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day” page that was banned in 2012, around the time that a number of Americans were protesting the fast-food chain after its chief operating officer made comments against same-sex marriage. Palmer Luckey, the virtual reality prodigy who parted ways with Facebooks after it was [reported](https://www.thedailybeast.com/palmer-luckey-the-facebook-near-billionaire-secretly-funding-trumps-meme-machine) that he backed a pro-Trump conservative group that trafficked in anti-Hillary Clinton content. Diamond and Silk, the outspoken Trump fangirls who were reportedly [told](https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/diamond-and-silk-offensive-appalling-that-facebook-found-our-content-to-be-unsafe-to-the-community) by Facebook this month that their “content and brand” were “unsafe to the community.” “There are a great many Americans who I would say are deeply concerned that Facebook and other tech companies are engaged in a pervasive pattern of bias and political censorship,” Cruz said. Zuckerberg conceded that Silicon Valley is “an extremely left-leaning place,” but denied Cruz’s insinuation that the bias had infiltrated the machinations of Facebook. When Cruz asked Zuckerberg if any members of the Facebook team tasked with monitoring users’ content had ever supported Republican political candidates, Zuckerberg said that he did not know. It was a telegenic moment for Cruz, who faces a tough reelection in Texas this November and now has a couple more clips for his campaign television ads. But the gambit whiffed slightly of hypocrisy — Cruz accepted [$7,500](http://www.houstonpress.com/content/printView/6740274) in donations from Facebook during his 2012 campaign, according to an investigation by the Sunlight Foundation. But more curious here is Cruz’s relationship to [Cambridge Analytica](http://time.com/5234740/facebook-data-misused-cambridge-analytica/), the data-mining firm that hangs over Zuckerberg’s two-day visit to Capitol Hill. Last month, it was reported that the firm had relied on a Facebook personality quiz to access the private data of nearly 90 million of the site’s users, precipitating a controversy over Facebook’s privacy policies that has culminated in Zuckerberg’s testimony. The Trump campaign’s work with Cambridge Analytica has at this point been meticulously documented. But before Trump was the Republican frontrunner, it was Ted Cruz who [gave](https://qz.com/1234364/cambridge-analytica-worked-for-mercer-backed-ted-cruz-before-trump/) the firm nearly $6 million to help his campaign with data-driven advertising. The topic did not come up in Cruz’s inquisition. ## Transcript [00:00] There are a great many Americans who I [00:04] think are deeply concerned that Facebook and other tech [00:07] companies are engaged in a pervasive pattern of bias [00:12] and political censorship. There have been numerous [00:15] instances with Facebook In May of 2016, Gizmodo [00:18] reported that Facebook had purposefully and routinely [00:21] suppressed conservative stories from trending news, [00:24] including stories about CPAC, including stories about Mitt [00:27] Romney, including stories about the Lois Lerner IRS [00:30] scandal, including stories about Glenn Beck. In [00:34] addition to that, Facebook has Initially shut down the [00:38] Chick- Fil- A appreciation day page, has blocked a post of a [00:42] Fox News reporter, has blocked over two dozen Catholic [00:47] pages, and most recently, blocked Trump supporter's [00:51] Diamond and Silk's page With 1. 2 million Facebook [00:54] followers. After determining their content and brand were, [00:57] quote unsafe to the community. To a great many [01:01] Americans, that appears to be a pervasive pattern [01:06] of political bias, do you agree with that assessment? [01:09] Senator, let me say a few things about this. First, I [01:13] understand where that concern is coming from, because [01:16] Facebook and the tech industry are located in Silicon [01:18] Valley, which is an extremely left- leaning place. And this is [01:22] actually a concern that I have and that I try to root out in the [01:25] company is making sure that we don't have Any bias [01:29] in the work that we do. And I think that it is a fair concern [01:33] that people would at least wonder about it. So let me ask [01:36] this question. Are you aware of any ad or page that has [01:39] been taken down from Planned Parenthood? Senator, [01:44] I'm not, but let me just. Can I finish? How about [01:46] moveon. org? Sorry? How about MoveOn. org? I'm not [01:50] specifically aware of those cases. How about any [01:52] Democratic candidate for office? I'm not specifically aware. [01:56] I mean, I'm not sure. In your testimony, you say that [02:00] you have 15 to 20, 000 people working on security and [02:03] content review Do you know the political orientation [02:07] of those 15 to 20 thousand people engage in content [02:10] review? No senator we do not generally ask people [02:14] about their political orientation when they are joining the [02:16] company. So as CEO have you ever made hiring or firing [02:19] decisions base on political positions or what candidates [02:22] they supported? No. Why was Pomerlocki fired? That [02:28] is a specifc personel matter that seems like it would be [02:31] inappropriate to speak to -> You just made a specific [02:33] representation that you didn't make decisions based on [02:35] political views. Well -> Is that accurate? I can commit that it [02:37] was not because of a political view. Do you know of those [02:41] 15 to 20 thousand people engaged in content review How [02:45] many, if any, have ever supported financially a Republican [02:49] candidate for office? Senator, I do not know that. Your [02:54] testimony says, it is not enough that we just connect [02:57] people. We have to make sure those connections are [03:00] positive. It says we have to make sure people aren't using [03:04] their voice to hurt people or spread misinformation. We [03:08] have a responsibility not just to build tools, to make sure [03:11] those tools are used for good. Mr. Zuckerberg, do you feel [03:13] it's your responsibility to assess users whether they are [03:16] good and positive connections or ones that those 15 to 20 [03:20] thousand people deem unacceptable or deplorable. [03:24] Senator are you asking me personally? Facebook. Senator [03:28] I think that there are a number of things that we would all [03:30] agree are clearly bad. Foreign interference in our [03:33] elections, terrorism, self harm. Those are things. I'm talking [03:36] about censorship. Well I think that you would probably [03:40] agree that we should remove terrorist propoganda from the [03:43] service. So that I agree, I think is clearly bad [03:47] activity that we want to get down. And we generally proud [03:50] of how well we do with that. What I can say, and I do [03:54] wanna get this said before the end here, is that I'm very [03:58] committed to making sure that Facebook is a platform for all [04:01] ideas. That is a very important founding principle of what [04:05] we do, and we are proud of the discourse and the different [04:08] ideas that people can share on the service. And that is [04:10] something that as long as I'm running the company. I'm [04:12] gonna be committed to making sure is the case. 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