Georgia
Georgia lawmaker who claims she was silenced when she switched political parties spotlights social media companies’ censorship
(The Center Square) — A Georgia state lawmaker who says she was silenced when she switched parties last year convened a hearing to showcase how social media companies can de-platform people to manipulate messaging.
Rep. Mesha Mainor, R-Atlanta, said she called the “First Amendment, Free Speech Rally” at the Georgia State Capitol to showcase what she sees as a lack of respect for dissenting opinions.
“One thing that has happened in America is we have lots of different opinions,” Mainor, who left the Democratic Party last year, said at the start of the hearing.
“But just because someone’s opinion is not of your own, does not mean that we should disrespect other people’s opinion. It also doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be open to listening to other people’s opinion.”
The parade of witnesses affected by deplatforming highlighted how social media companies’ decisions, often cloaked in secrecy, impact their livelihoods.
“It sets a dangerous precedent to where tech companies have the power to silence dissenting voices, reshaping the narrative to fit their agendas,” Nick Miles, a business owner and the former director of events for the WalkAway Campaign, said.
“This control over public discourse is a direct assault on the principles of free speech and open debate.”
“We must ask ourselves, ‘Who gets to decide which voices are heard and which are silenced?’” Miles added.
“When social media platforms, designed to be spaces of free expression and exchange of ideas, become the arbiters of truth, we tread a dangerous path. The ability to question, challenge, and dissent is not just the right; it is the lifeblood of our democracy.”
The group said its Facebook page was removed after the Jan. 6, 2021 attack at the U.S. Capitol.
Matt Taibbi, an investigative journalist who published the “Twitter Files,” said government or congressional agencies might take an interest in a site and send a letter to a social media platform saying they want the company to review content and, at its discretion, determine whether it violates the terms of service.
“So, the platforms communicate with each other; they communicate with the government, as well,” Taibbi said during the hearing.
“This is the sort of unseen process that leads to … a lot of these accounts being taken down.
“I think it violates the First Amendment,” Taibbi added.
“Is this kind of communication legal? Is it constitutional? I think it isn’t. But WalkAway, I think, is one of the primary examples of the government seeing something that isn’t there or inventing something that isn’t there and suppressing speech of legitimate citizens as a result.”
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Kirk Fordice-like Rick Jackson is sounding a whole lot like Daniel Kirkwood Fordice as he tries to be elected Georgia’s next governor.
Fordice came out of nowhere — actually, Vicksburg is somewhere but you know what I mean — in 1991 to become a two-term Mississippi governor.
He had money but nothing like Jackson, a billionaire businessman who’s also trying to emerge from nowhere politically to win Georgia’s top office.
“The establishment hated Trump, because they couldn’t control him. They are going to hate me,” Jackson says in an ad for Georgia’s Republican Primary on May 19, sounding like one of my favorite Mississippi governors — Fordice, because of his unpredictable personality (he could vilify or charm you, all in one sentence), not his politics. He died in 2004 of cancer.
I stood by a cafe entrance one morning, waiting to cover a Fordice speech. When he appeared, I stuck out my hand to shake his. “I’m not shaking your damn hand. You’re part of the problem down there (referring to the newspaper),” he told me, smiling and moving on.
Jackson rose to become one of economic giant-Georgia’s wealthiest people. He came from Atlanta’s rough midtown area, ending up in the foster care system. He left college due to poor financial circumstances.
The 71-year-old Jackson wormed his way into the dynamic city’s business scene in the late 1970s, mostly of the healthcare variety with mixed success before starting a workforce staffing and services company and later an antibiotics manufacturing plant. He turned those businesses into billion-dollar enterprises.
“It’s God’s money,” he said in rural Blakely, and he’s been charitable with it.
Jackson doesn’t try to hide his vast wealth. His family lives in a 48,000-square-foot mansion at Cumming, a place of nearly 100,000 people near Atlanta in Forsyth County, which once promoted its almost all-white population as a virtue.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist Bill Torpy recently wrote that Jackson will spend a ton of his own money in seeking another mansion, the one occupied by Georgia’s governor. Torpy noted that present Lt. Gov. Burt Jones was once heavily favored to win the primary race, but he’s fallen behind Jackson’s bold money bid.
“The one-time front-runner in the Republican primary (Jones) has been relegated to No. 2, the result of a $100 million Mack truck running him over.
Rick Jackson, a billionaire healthcare tycoon, a man with a sly smile and reptilian gaze, is the guy driving that truck,” Torpy wrote.
The GOP field includes Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger, who spurned Trump’s demand to find 11,780 votes that would’ve allowed him to win Georgia in 2020.
Fordice was effective with some bombastic rhetoric during his run for governor, but I don’t remember it reaching the histrionic level employed by Jackson. In a major ad blitz, often referencing (Georgia college student) Laken Riley’s murderer, Jackson promises that unauthorized immigrants committing violent crimes will be “deported or departed … any questions?”
In another ad, Jackson growled, “Like President Trump, I don’t owe anybody anything, and like you, I’m sick of career politicians.”
Fordice spent only $1 million to get himself elected Mississippi’s governor. He somewhat sneaked up on the establishment, riding no escalator to the first floor of his Vicksburg concrete river mats-contracting office to declare his intentions. Who could ever forget his announcement seeking the governorship that ran on page 5 of the Clarion Ledger?
Recent polling ahead of Georgia’s May primaries for governor shows the eventual Republican nominee faces a strong Democrat in the November general election, most likely former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. That’ll require another whole pot of money.
— Mac Gordon, a native of McComb, is a retired Mississippi newspaperman. He can be reached at macmarygordon@gmail.com.
Gulfstream recently announced a $5 million investment in Georgia education, welcoming students and leaders to its Savannah headquarters.
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