Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was not a fan of Facebook and it doesn’t appear that she is a fan of Meta either. After Facebook underwent its initial rebrand on Wednesday, the New York lawmaker took to Twitter to voice her disdain for the company and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg.
“I am proud to announce that, starting today, our company is now Meta,” Zuckerberg said in a video announcing the company’s rebrand.
“Meta as in ‘we are a cancer to democracy metastasizing into a global surveillance and propaganda machine for boosting authoritarian regimes and destroying civil society… for profit,'” Ocasio-Cortez replied in a subsequent tweet.
This is far from the first time that Ocasio-Cortez has taken issue with the popular social media giant. In the past, she has referred to the company as a “problem” for American democracy.
“Facebook may have its own problems, but it’s increasingly starting to look like our society (namely, our democracy) has a Facebook problem,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted in 2019.
More recently, Facebook has come under fire for its handling of Instagram algorithms, political ads during elections and misinformation campaigns pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic. Regardless of political affiliation, it appears that many federal lawmakers have taken issue with the company.
“Changing Facebook’s name doesn’t change what you’ve done, Mark,” Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn said, according to The Verge.
“You can run, but you can’t hide, Facebook. A new nom de plume may confuse & distract, but won’t erase years of devious practices & disregard for privacy, kids’ wellbeing, spreading hate [and] genocide,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal added.
