Said to have repeatedly and intentionally, violated the State of Washington’s campaign-ad transparency laws, a judge recently ruled, that Facebook is guilty and must pay penalties. Ridiculing Facebook’s “cynical attempt” to gut the state’s campaign finance laws, Washington Attorney General, Bob Ferguson, challenged the Masters of the Universe to “follow the law.”
Facebook (now known as Meta) repeatedly and intentionally, violated Washington’s campaign-ad transparency laws and must pay, yet-to-be-determined penalties, according to a ruling made by King County Superior Court Judge Douglass North - as reported by the Seattle Times.
The law states, that ad sellers must disclose the name and address of political ad buyers, and metrics, such as the total number of ad views generated. But Facebook believed it shouldn’t have to follow the law, though every newspaper and other outlet in the state, follows the rule without any major problem.
The court denied Facebook’s attempt to invalidate Washington’s decades-old transparency law, according to Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s office, who repeatedly sued Facebook. Ferguson said, that following a ruling made Friday, by King County Superior Court Judge Douglass North, the Attorney General’s office defeated Facebook’s “cynical attempt” to gut Washington’s campaign-finance transparency law. Ferguson said -
“On behalf of the people of Washington, I challenge Facebook to accept this decision and do something very simple — follow the law,”
- Washington Attorney General, Bob Ferguson
Originally passed in 1972, Washington’s transparency law, requires ad sellers such as Meta to disclose the names and addresses of political ad buyers, the targets of the ads, and the total number of views each ad receives. However, Facebook repeatedly objected to the requirements and argued in a summary judgment motion, that Washington’s law is an “outlier” that it “unduly burdens political speech,” and is “virtually impossible to comply with.”
Judge North, in court, rejected Facebook’s arguments, stating that the company had failed to show it was unable to comply.
“This is clearly a very appropriate subject for disclosure, and the law is very constitutional”
- King County Superior Court Judge, Douglass North
The law allows financial positions of $10,000 per violation, which can be tripled when violations are determined to be intentional. Since the Attorney General’s Office, alleges that Facebook has committed several hundred violations since 2018, their fine should be hefty. The exact penalties to be levied against them, will be determined at a later court hearing.
Again, this speaks to the rule of law. In Facebooks case, (Meta) Mark Zuckerberg, obviously believes that the rule of law does not apply to him - he whines - it’s too hard to follow the rules (like everyone else). How pathetic is that? Anyway, this is another case of the “Masters Of The Universe” proclaiming how special they think they are. Reality check Mark – you have to follow the same rule of law as everyone else. A wise person once said – “straighten up and fly right!”.
Bloggers Comment –
“This was the case other States were watching so I expect there to now be a number of court filings elsewhere very soon..”
-RoadRunner0, Brietbart Blogger
“The American people are happy to help small businesses grow, but paying fines for multi-millionaires, subsidizing bad behavior, should not be the responsibility of American taxpayers.”
-Tony Cardenas