Conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation has declined donations from Google and Facebook because of the companies' censoring of persons and groups with conservative points of view.
Outgoing foundation president Kay C. James sent letters to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google CEO Sundar Pichai explaining that the Heritage Foundation could "Not in good conscience accept money" from companies that suppress conservative speech and content.
Heritage turned down a $225,000 donation from Google and returned a $150,000 donation from Facebook in October 2020.
While the federal government has a handful of antitrust laws they have introduced, state-level officials have also begun holding the Big Tech companies to account, with many governors and attorney generals filing lawsuits and changing policies to rein in the companies and require more transparency in their user policies.
"The Heritage Foundation has all too often fallen victim to Facebook's double standard. Referrals to our Daily Signal news site, for example, have plunged from 600,000 sessions in July to a mere 105,000 so far in Oct.," she wrote, requesting that the CEO explain the decrease in their traffic.
She told Pichai that his company has twice censored The Heritage Foundation's videos.
Axios reported that in the past, Google had donated $1.55 million to The Heritage Foundation while Facebook gave $275,000.
Saturday, March 27, 2021
Conservative Heritage Foundation Turns Down Six-Figure Donations From Google, Facebook
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