YouTube will no longer take down false claims about U.S. elections

https://www.npr.org/2023/06/02/ [login to see] /youtube-will-no-longer-take-down-false-claims-about-u-s-elections
YouTube will no longer remove videos falsely claiming the 2020 U.S. presidential election was stolen, reversing a policy put in place in the contentious weeks following the 2020 vote.

The Google-owned video platform said in a blog post that it has taken down "tens of thousands" of videos questioning the integrity of past U.S. presidential elections since it created the policy in December 2020.

But two and a half years later, the company said it "will stop removing content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches occurred in the 2020 and other past U.S. Presidential elections" because things have changed. It said the decision was "carefully deliberated."

"In the current environment, we find that while removing this content does curb some misinformation, it could also have the unintended effect of curtailing political speech without meaningfully reducing the risk of violence or other real-world harm," YouTube said.