White House press secretary Jen Psaki also tried to clarify Biden’s remarks. “We are not in a war or a battle with Facebook, we’re in a battle with the virus,” she said.
Covid-19 misinformation has spread during the pandemic on social media sites including Facebook, Twitter and Alphabet-owned YouTube. Researchers and lawmakers have long accused Facebook of failing to police harmful content on its platforms.
When asked on Friday about his message to Facebook and other social media platforms, Biden responded: “They’re killing people. … Look, the only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated. And they’re killing people.”
Facebook responded sharply last week, saying that 85% of its users were vaccinated or wanted to be. “President Biden’s goal was for 70% of Americans to be vaccinated by July 4.
Facebook is not the reason this goal was missed,” Facebook said in a corporate blog post by Guy Rosen, a company vice president.
The company has introduced rules against making specific false claims about Covid-19 and vaccines to prevent the illness, and says it provides people with reliable information on these topics.
