YouTube adds disclaimer to Heritage Foundation video on mail-in ballots

YouTube has posted a disclaimer to a video produced by The Heritage Foundation that warns of the potential problems of mass voting by mail.

YouTube didn’t say it disputed any of the facts in the video, which was posted Sept. 2 and details recent problems with mail-in primary elections. The video cites mainstream media reporting and the U.S. Election Assistance Commission on ballots sent back to voters as “undelivered, misdelivered or reported missing.”

However, YouTube posted a disclaimer below the video citing information from the Bipartisan Policy Center that it labels as “Context.”

The disclaimer reads: “Mail-in ballots that meet eligibility and validity requirements are counted in every election. The law requires all valid votes to be counted in every election regardless of how they are cast.”

“This is unfair and ill-informed censorship by YouTube,” Hans von Spakovsky, manager of the Election Law Reform Initiative at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal.

Similarly, YouTube added the same “context” disclaimer to at least two other Heritage videos. One features von Spakovsky in a Newsmax interview about an FBI investigation of mai-in ballots in Pennsylvania; the other includes audio in which von Spakovsky talks about potential disenfranchisement as a result of mail-in ballots.

YouTube previously removed another video produced in 2017 by The Daily Signal, in which Dr. Michelle Cretella, a pediatrician and executive director of the American College of Pediatricians, talked about gender reassignment surgery. The Daily Signal is the multimedia news organization of The Heritage Foundation

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Facebook removes Trump ads that claim accepting refugees from abroad increases COVID-19 risks

Facebook said Wednesday that it had taken down ads from the Trump campaign that claimed without evidence that accepting refugees from abroad would increase risks related to the coronavirus pandemic.

“We rejected these ads because we don’t allow claims that people’s physical safety, health, or survival is threatened by people on the basis of their national origin or immigration status,” Facebook spokesperson Andy Stone said in a statement.

The ads included a video of Joe Biden talking about the border, overlaid with text about “the health risks” from an “increase in refugees.” It also alleged that Biden would increase the number of refugees arriving from Syria, Somalia and Yemen by 700 percent. The ads cited no sources.

The Trump campaign began running the ads Tuesday with at least 38 different versions before Facebook determined that the ads ran afoul of the company’s advertising policies.

One version was targeted at Facebook users in Florida and received 5,000 to 6,000 impressions before it was taken down, according to Facebook’s online ad library. Another version targeted people in North Carolina and received 60,000 to 70,000 impressions.

President Donald Trump’s campaign stood behind the ad, asserting again in a separate statement that if Biden were president and allowed in refugees, Americans would be exposed to further risk of Covid-19.

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