Miranda Devine: Facebook Spied on PMs of Americans Who Questioned 2020 Election

BUCK: We know that Facebook is left-wing dominated and helps Democrats. We know the FBI seems to have a habit of being a deep state arm of the DNC using federal law enforcement power to the political benefit of the left. But what about the prospect of those two things, those two entities working together? A piece in the New York Post: “Facebook Spied on Private Messages of Americans Who Questioned the 2020 Election.” It brings up Facebook spying on behalf of the FBI, and Miranda Devine — the author of this great piece — is with us now. Miranda, good to talk to you.

DEVINE: Good talk to you.

EXCLUSIVE! 🔥 Column’s up: Facebook and FBI spying on private messages of Americans who questioned 2020 election. https://t.co/TapPQaPN4X

— Miranda Devine (@mirandadevine) September 15, 2022

BUCK: So, tell me what’s going on here. I mean, we’ve got a situation underway here where people already know that Facebook and Big Tech in general are effectively an arm of the DNC when push comes to shove at election time, the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop — your story at the New York Post about all that — and now we have Facebook working with the FBI and looking at people for what exactly?

DEVINE: Exactly. Well, I mean they seem to be red flagging private messages of users, American users on Facebook which are anti-government or anti-authority or might be questioning the 2020 election. Nothing illegal, nothing criminal, nothing violent. Facebook is spying on those messages and then — without a subpoena — they are forwarding them to the FBI, to their domestic terrorism unit in Washington, D.C., and from there those messages, those leads are farmed out to various FBI field offices and they are then supposed to get a subpoena and get that information the legal way.

But they already know what they’re looking for because Facebook’s already shown them without due process, without a subpoena, without a warrant. It’s done outside the legal process. And the reason we know this is because there are now whistleblowers that are coming forward from the Department of Justice and the FBI, and they are incredibly courageous. They are people of integrity, and they have decided that their conscience has troubled them too much, that they see that the institutions that they loved — federal law enforcement — is being weaponized and politicized. And they are basically being used as pawns to prosecute a political case against Joe Biden’s enemies.

CLAY: Miranda, do you think everybody out there should presume — Twitter, Instagram, TikTok certainly, Facebook — based on what you’re reporting, that everything you do is constantly and possibly going to be shared with governmental authorities? I kind of feel this way about my Twitter account. I’m conscious of what I put into DMs now because I’m like, “There’s no way that I can trust that Twitter is going to have any privacy for anything that exists on my account.” You obviously wrote about the Hunter Biden laptop. You have to feel like your text messages and your communications and I think a lot of people out there who lean a little bit right or even middle of the road have to feel that way with the Biden administration. Should every person be contemplating this and assuming that it’s going on?

DEVINE: Absolutely. This is a really serious point that you raise. I think we really are living in the equivalent of East Germany with the Stasi that is spying on everything. I mean, remember, the FBI spied on Rudy Giuliani’s cloud, a month his emails, all his text messages, for two years —

CLAY: Yeah.

DEVINE: — for weeks after he became President Trump, then sitting President Trump’s personal lawyer and right through the period where the whistleblower from the laptop repair shop in Delaware contacted Rudy Giuliani, emailed him with what he had. So the FBI knew back in late August of 2020 if were they watching those emails — which they were, unless they were being derelict. They had access to them, but they knew what was coming, and they would also have seen text messages between me and Rudy Giuliani which basically indicated, you know, that the New York Post was imminently publishing.

And that’s even with Rudy Giuliani and me and everyone who talks to him being quite careful about what they commit to email or text. But I don’t even think we can trust encrypted messaging apps, certainly not WhatsApp which is now owned by Facebook. We know that the intelligence services are looking and have partnered with countries like Australia in the Five Eyes to get backdoor access into encrypted messaging. And, you know, we all used to think that this was a good thing because it was preventing terrorist attacks and, you know, child pornography and on. But that immense power has now been turned on to American citizens for the crime of questioning the 2020 election, for the crime of supporting Donald Trump, for the crime of just being conservative and not agreeing with what Joe Biden’s doing to the country.

The more we find out about the FBI’s coverup of the Hunter Biden situation, the more damning it becomes.@MirandaDevine exposes the Deep State.

Learn more here: https://t.co/QcIuTgaPm1

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— The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show (@clayandbuck) September 9, 2022

CLAY: Miranda, I want to build on something you just said. We know, based on what Mark Zuckerberg told Joe Rogan, that he believed — because of an FBI briefing — that there was going to be Russian disinformation. We know that Rudy Giuliani’s cloud, that his text messages and all those things were under constant surveillance by the government. And we know that you at the New York Post were working on this story about the 100% accurate Hunter Biden laptop story. Do you feel like that was a direct attempt by the FBI, before those 51 people came out and said it was Russian disinformation, to try and tell Big Tech, “Hey, this story is coming,” based on what they know was occurring because of Rudy Giuliani’s surveillance? Do you feel like that was the motivation to have a meeting with Mark Zuckerberg and say, “Hey, Russian disinformation may well be coming”?

DEVINE: For sure. Because that FBI debriefing or defensive briefing that they gave to Facebook just very shortly before our story came out, they knew at that time exactly what was going on. They knew that Rudy had the laptop. They (audio drop) gave explicit enough detail to Facebook so that they basically could recognize immediately within an hour that our story was exactly what the FBI had been warning about. And I don’t think it’s any coincidence that the exact same narrative about Russian disinformation was applied by those 51 former intel experts or intelligence officials who should hang their heads in shame.

They are appalling people. They included four former CIA directives: Leon Panetta, John Brennan, Michael Hayden. These people behaved in a very improper way, those 51 people, by having not looked at the laptop, not even asked us for any of the material that we had and then declaring — four days after our story came out — that it was Russian disinformation. Who can get 51 people to sign onto something in four days? And of course, that later was used (audio drop) in the debate against Donald Trump, that last debate, to just kibosh any suggestion that he was corrupt or that the laptop was real.

BUCK: Funny they’re not actually seeking out the disinformation. They’re spreading it! Miranda Devine, thank you so much for your piece. ClayAndBuck.com, guys, we have it linked, her New York Post editorial: “Facebook Spied on Private Messages of Americans Who Questioned the 2020 Election.” Miranda, thanks again.