{"id":1567,"date":"2026-06-12T17:36:23","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T17:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanmovershub.com\/?p=1567"},"modified":"2026-06-12T17:36:23","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T17:36:23","slug":"violent-threats-against-lawmakers-surged-after-meta-eased-content-moderation-report-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanmovershub.com\/?p=1567","title":{"rendered":"Violent threats against lawmakers surged after Meta eased content moderation, report finds"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A new report shows that violent threats against lawmakers have surged online after Big Tech companies such as Meta have rolled back moderation policies and program algorithms to prioritize inflammatory content. <\/p>\n

Read more \u2018Erratic\u2019 driver slams into a home into Utah home, police say<\/a><\/p>\n

Now, Utah Sen. John Curtis wants to do something about it. <\/p>\n

\u201cPeople have the right to say what they want to say,\u201d Curtis told the Deseret News in a statement. \u201cPeople can say whatever they want, that\u2019s not the problem. The problem is when the social media companies use their algorithms to amplify those, and so they get to decide, \u2018OK, this is a message we want 100 million people to see, we\u2019re just going to cram it down their throats.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

A recent report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate found that violent threats online have quadrupled since Meta implemented a new policy in January 2025 reining in its moderation practices. Since then, instances of threats, hate and harassment all tripled in that time frame. <\/p>\n

The study analyzed nearly 8 million comments on Facebook directed toward 100 members of Congress over a yearlong period \u2014 six months before the moderation policy change and six months after. The report found that abusive comments rose from roughly 24,000 comments before the policy change to 78,000 comments afterward. <\/p>\n

Violent threats quadrupled from 1,800 comments to 7,600 comments; harassment rose from 15,700 comments to nearly 40,000; and threats directly targeting President Donald Trump doubled in that time period. <\/p>\n

But the problem, Curtis argues, isn\u2019t necessarily the comments themselves. Instead, the fault lies with social media companies who amplify hateful comments to increase engagement \u2014 thereby creating a reward system for bad behavior. <\/p>\n

Read more Deseret News archives: \u2018Tear down this wall.\u2019 \u2026 If it were only that easy<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat these social media companies are doing, is they\u2019re ginning up this anger by selecting some of the worst messages, amplifying them, and there\u2019s no accountability for that,\u201d Curtis said. \u201cSection 230 protects them from that. So I feel that this is a little bit of \u2014 in legal terms, they call it duty of care. We need to hold them responsible for that, and I think if you did that one thing alone, this would dramatically change.\u201d<\/p>\n

Curtis has long called for reforms to the social media landscape, even going so far as to introduce a bill late last year proposing updates to Section 230 to no longer offer protections for tech companies if it can be proved that the platforms knowingly used an algorithm to amplify content responsible for causing harm. The change would instead mandate that companies \u201cown\u201d the content, which would allow individuals to sue them directly.<\/p>\n

That bill, the Algorithm Accountability Act, has yet to get a vote in Congress. <\/p>\n

In practice, the bill would establish requirements for social media platforms to \u201cdesign, train, test, deploy, operate, and maintain their recommendation-based algorithm to prevent foreseeable bodily injury or death.\u201d It would also provide a \u201cclear civil right of action\u201d to take legal action.<\/p>\n

The debate comes as lawmakers have long grappled with whether content moderation on social media platforms amounts to a suppression of speech. But while Republicans and Democrats have often found themselves on the opposite side of that debate, Curtis said guardrails can be put in place by simply not amplifying hateful content without stripping anyone of their right to express an opinion. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you watch the hearings between Republicans and Democrats, you\u2019ll get comments like Republicans saying \u2018Why did you censor this,\u2019 and the Democrats saying, \u2018Why didn\u2019t you censor this,\u2019\u201d Curtis said, \u201cThat\u2019s a debate I don\u2019t think anybody\u2019s going to win about what can be said and what can\u2019t be said. But I do believe you can, you can solve that quickly by just not amplifying the things that are said, and then they kind of die on their own.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more How a Utah company is aiding the fight against Ebola<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Congress may need to step in as tech companies fail to self-regulate harmful content, Sen. John Curtis says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1566,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1567","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nViolent threats against lawmakers surged after Meta eased content moderation, report finds - American Movers Hub<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/americanmovershub.com\/?p=1567\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Violent threats against lawmakers surged after Meta eased content moderation, report finds - American Movers Hub\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Congress may need to step in as tech companies fail to self-regulate harmful content, Sen. 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