BUDAPEST, Hungary, May 18, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) – By establishing an “Oversight Board,” Facebook has caved to Hungarian-born far-left billionaire George Soros’ agenda, according to the Hungarian government.
Zoltán Kovács, Secretary of State for International Communication and Relations, published an article on “About Hungary,” the website of the International Communications Office of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
Kovács based his article on a statement put out by the Free Speech Alliance (FSA), which consists of more than 60 organizations and individuals who oppose the silencing of conservative voices on social media. LifeSiteNews is part of the Free Speech Alliance.
“Earlier this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Soros shocked more than a few people by claiming Facebook was working with Donald Trump to get him re-elected,” Kovács wrote.
“This wasn’t the first time that Soros had taken on the social media giant, but it was the first time that Mark Zuckerberg appears to have caved to the wishes of the billionaire ‘philanthropist,’” he continued.
In January 2020, Soros had written, “Facebook can post deliberately misleading or false statements by candidates for public office and others, and take no responsibility for them.”
“I believe that Mr. Trump and Facebook’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, realize that their interests are aligned – the president’s in winning elections, Mr. Zuckerberg’s in making money,” Soros claimed in The New York Times.
“The responsible approach is self-evident,” the billionaire went on. “Facebook is a publisher not just a neutral moderator or ‘platform.’ It should be held accountable for the content that appears on its site.”
He concluded, “I repeat and reaffirm my accusation against Facebook under the leadership of Mr. Zuckerberg and Ms. (Sheryl) Sandberg. They follow only one guiding principle: maximize profits irrespective of the consequences. One way or another, they should not be left in control of Facebook.”
According to the government of Hungary, Facebook’s “Oversight Board” created in May “appears to be packed with liberals, including more than one with direct ties to Soros himself.”
“A bit of digging,” Kovács said, referring to the FSA statement, “reveals many ties to Soros-funded organizations and mouthpieces.”
The FSA had pointed out that of the four co-chairs of the “Oversight Board,” three are “reliably liberal.”
Columbia Law Prof. Jamal Greene was an aide to Senator Kamala Harris (D-California) during the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings. Catalina Botero-Marino is the dean of the Universidad de los Andes Faculty of Law of Colombia. She is also a member of the board of directors of the Center for Reproductive Rights, a pro-abortion group. That is especially infuriating to pro-life groups that are regularly targeted on social media for their beliefs. No pro-life leader need apply to this board.
Then there’s the former prime minister of Denmark, Helle Thorning-Schmidt. She declared she “does not believe in eternal life, salvation or heaven and hell,” according to the publication Kristligt Dagblad.
Thorning-Schmidt is also one of at least six of the 15 international members of the board who openly espouse anti-Trump sentiments. She posted recently on Twitter over a photo of Obama endorsing presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden: “The endorsement!! OMG, Miss the voice of decency and grace.”
The other members of the “Oversight Board” were chosen by the co-chairs. Three of the 20 members are directly linked to George Soros.
“One works directly for his Open Society organizations,” the FSA revealed. “Another was the founding dean at Central European University, which Soros founded and funded with nearly $1 billion. Even Oversight Board Executive Director Thomas Hughes comes from Article 19, which has received more than $2 million from Soros.”
While the Hungarian government claims to have “already seen the censorship of content … the establishment of this board to have supposedly far-reaching decision-making authority with such an imbalanced, left-leaning composition takes matters to a new, troubling level.”
Referring to Soros, Kovács asked, “How does this private citizen, a person who promotes an ideology far outside the mainstream, along with a group of his like-minded associates, paid employees and sympathizers move in to become regulators-in-chief for a platform catering to over 30 percent of the world’s population?”
Kovács concluded by turning to Soros’ article in The New York Times, in which he said Zuckerberg and Sandberg “should not be left in control of Facebook” as they only want to “maximize profits.”
“That strikes me as deeply cynical,” Kovács commented, “coming from a man who said in an interview that ‘I am basically there to make money. I cannot and do not look at the social consequences of what I do.’”
Kovács felt reminded of communism since Zuckerberg “is one of the founders and controlling shareholders of Facebook. But in the Soros worldview, ideology trumps all and if a powerful platform like Facebook does not toe the open society party line, then ownership control must be taken away.”
Soros is a prolific financier of left-wing causes throughout the United States and around the world, including abortion, euthanasia, population control, same-sex “marriage,” transgenderism, and more.
His Open Society Foundations spend almost $1 billion annually in 100 different countries, including $150 million per year funding the left-wing American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the leading abortion company Planned Parenthood, and other liberal groups. He invested $5.1 million in a super PAC dedicated to funding groups working against Trump’s re-election; and is an aggressive supporter of the European Union who has spent money in hopes of influencing the elections of multiple European nations.
In January, he announced the launch of an international network for educational institutions for the purpose of advancing his interpretation of “democratic values” and combating the rise of “nationalism.”
Earlier this month, Soros indicated that the coronavirus pandemic paves the way for societal changes previously thought impossible, calling it “the crisis of my lifetime.” Soros had lived through the Second World War as a youth.
Even before the pandemic hit, “I realized that we were in a revolutionary moment where what would be impossible or even inconceivable in normal times had become not only possible, but probably absolutely necessary,” he said.
In the same interview, he also voiced his concern “about the survival of the (European Union) because it is an incomplete union.”