Polygraph

Major social media censorship occurred in 2018 and 2020.

Posted by The Health Ranger Report, Checked

Polygraph verdictMixed
Sources
1 contradict4 support
Said
1 time·
Confidence
50%
The Health Ranger ReportOct 22, 2026
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Sources document specific platform actions affecting political speech in both years: Twitter's 2018 shadow-banning of Republicans (per a House GOP report and Wikipedia citing VICE) and Twitter's 2020 labeling of Trump's mail-in voting tweets (PolitiFact).

A detail. The sources confirm the gist; the verdict faults a detail such as a date, number or wording.

What was said

… Well, actually, I think that we're going to find out before that. I think, I think we're going to find the answer to that under Trump, because this is just the reality. We endured more censorship while Trump was president than Biden. That is just a fact. The big censorship happened in 2018 and 2020, when Trump was president. So I think we have to weigh that when we, when we have this discussion. I anticipate we might start seeing it under Trump, actually, more than anything. …
The Health Ranger Report · · from the transcriptPost →

What we found

Contradicts. PolitiFact describes the 2020 action as an added link on tweets it calls unsubstantiated, not as censorship or removal, which weakens the 'major censorship' characterization for that year.[1]

Supports. A House Judiciary Republican report describes Twitter temporarily shadow-banning prominent Republicans, including Jim Jordan and Devin Nunes, in summer 2018.[3][4]

Supports. Wikipedia's entry on Censorship by X states that a 2018 'quality filter' led to accusations of shadow banning, and that Twitter later acknowledged the problem after a VICE writer confirmed many Republicans had been shadow-banned.[5]

Supports. PolitiFact reports that in May 2020 Twitter added a cautionary link to Trump's mail-in voting tweets, which it described as the first such flag on a Trump tweet about election fraud.[1]

Supports. AP reports that in October 2020 Facebook and Twitter moved quickly to limit the spread of a disputed tabloid story about Joe Biden and Ukraine, and that CEOs were expected to testify about content moderation.[2]

Context. The 2018 and 2020 platform-moderation evidence is mostly from a partisan House report and general coverage; it does not establish a 'major' scale that the claim asserts.[1][3][4]

Sources

5 sources: 2 fact-checkers, 2 primary, 1 not rated

  1. 1Fact-checking Trump, Twitter enters uncharted waterspolitifact.com · fact-checker · cited for: contradicts, supports, context
  2. 2Facebook, Twitter CEOs ordered to testify by GOP senators - AP Newsapnews.com · fact-checker · cited for: supports
  3. 3REINING IN BIG TECH’S CENSORSHIP OF CONSERVATIVESjudiciary.house.gov · primary source · cited for: supports, context
  4. 4REINING IN BIG TECH’S CENSORSHIP OF CONSERVATIVESsteube.house.gov · primary source · cited for: supports, context
  5. 5Censorship by X - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org · not rated · cited for: supports

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