Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta (formerly Facebook) which is owned by billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, replied to a post on X by journalist Judd Legum, writer of the Popular Information newsletter.
Legum wrote: “Elon Musk has spent this week spreading false & misleading information about voting to his 168 million followers. Musk used these erroneous claims to justify massive restrictions on voting, including ending early voting and most mail-in voting.”
Legum is referring to a January 10 post in which Musk wrote that he was surprised to learn that “illegals are not prevented from voting in federal elections.” Legum replied: “That claim is absolutely false.”
2. On January 10, Musk posted that he recently learned "illegals are not prevented from voting in federal elections," and that "came as a surprise."
— Judd Legum (@JuddLegum) January 11, 2024
That claim is absolutely false. pic.twitter.com/2fXRbX3PxA
LeCun interjected and wrote: “You know Elon, properly-run social networks do their best to take down misinformation about elections.”
Although LeCun didn’t tag Musk in his post, Musk replied to the AI scientist: “Funny you should mention ‘properly-run’ social networks. Are you aware that Mark Zuckerberg, presumably a ‘proper-runner’ of social networks, funded illegal voting vans in the last election?,” and provided a link to an AP article ‘Wisconsin judge rules that absentee voting van used in 2022 was illegal.’
Funny you should mention “properly-run” social networks.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 12, 2024
Are you aware that Mark Zuckerberg, presumably a “proper-runner” of social networks, funded illegal voting vans in the last election?https://t.co/Sfno4ftHoc https://t.co/7d6nuwSGxq
Wisconsin Republicans challenged Racine’s use of a voting van that traveled around the city in 2022 and collected early ballots. According to the article, the van was “purchased with grant money Racine received from the Center for Tech and Civic Life, the nonprofit created by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife.”
According to the Center for Tech and Civic Life’s website, the organization was not created by the Zuckerberg but was founded by three professionals: civic technologist Tiana Epps-Johnson, former election official Whitney May, and civic data expert Donny Bridges.
Over the years, Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan have committed $300 million to CTCL.
Facebook is listed as a key funder of CTCL, as is Google, Knight Foundation, Rock the Vote, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and the Democracy Fund (which was created by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar), among others.
