New revelations accuse Facebook Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg of doing more than just censoring information to influence the 2020 election. A new report alleges he also gave over $400 million to two organizations that funded local government election offices – and it came with strings attached.
Writing for the New York Post, William Doyle reported that Zuckerberg gave $419.5 million dollars to two non-profit organizations, The Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) and the Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR), that ostensibly donated money to local election offices for their operations.
However, according to former Ohio Attorney General Ken Blackwell, the funds came with specific instructions on how the money was to be spent.
Blackwell wrote the organizations “dictated exactly how elections were to be conducted, down to the number of ballot drop boxes and polling places. The Constitution gives state lawmakers sole authority for managing elections, but these grants put private interests firmly in control.”
CTCL also demanded there be universal mail-in voting by suspending existing election laws and extending deadlines that “favored mail-in over in-person voting” while also expanding “opportunities for ballot curing,” according to the New York Post.
For example, the two Zuckerberg organizations funded “vote navigators” in the swing state of Wisconsin. The vote navigators “assisted voters, potentially at their front doors, to answer questions, assist in ballot curing, and witness absentee ballot signatures.”
CTCL claimed some of the funds were used to protect poll workers to help keep them safe from contracting the virus. But, according to The Federalists’ Mollie Hemmingway, “relatively little money was spent on measures to guard the health of election workers.”
These organizations appear to have had an outsized impact on the final election tallies. According to research conducted by the New York Post, Zuckerberg’s funds “significantly increased” Joe Biden’s vote margin in the key swing states.
Mark Zuckerberg has been the recipient of much scrutiny lately. And this latest information adds to the growing list of controversies plaguing the social media pioneer.