An “independent fact-checking” organization censored a Federalist post on Facebook on Thursday but never specifically addressed the material outlined in the article in question.
Lead Stories, an organization that relies on funding from Silicon Valley tech giants Google and Facebook and Chinese-operated ByteDance to censor posts as Big Tech’s henchmen, added the “false information” label to a Federalist article shortly after it was posted. The article highlighted green power’s failures during the Texas winter storm and blackout.
The reason for the label, the rating stated in the “see why” category, was that “independent fact-checkers say this information has no basis in fact.” The “fact-check” article accompanying the rating, supposedly offering more information to back up this vague statement, however, didn’t ever address The Federalist’s article by name or in content.
On the contrary, the Lead Stories’ “hoax alert” article focuses on debunking a Facebook post earlier this week from a user who noted the green energy sector’s failures during the Texas power crisis. The “fact-check” author — citing some of the same sources listed in Jason Isaac’s Federalist article, such as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) — said this assertion was in direct conflict with the claims from so-called experts who tweeted their thoughts from unverified accounts.
“In sum, blackouts are real, but renewable energy sources are not the primary cause,” the “fact-check” concluded.
In his article, Federalist contributor Isaac notes that green energy sources such as wind and solar maintain “fundamental unreliability and impracticality,” but blames the energy catastrophe that left millions without electricity for days in subzero temperatures on “the lavish suite of government incentives” given to green energy initiatives, which have repeatedly failed to keep up with Texas’s electricity demand.
“They guarantee profits to big, often foreign corporations and lead to market distortions that prevent reliable generators from building the capacity we need to keep the lights on when wind and solar don’t show up,” Isaac wrote.
None of these statements, cited sources, or even Isaac’s name are mentioned in the presumed “fact-check,” yet the rating on The Federalist Facebook page still stands.
Lead Stories did not respond to The Federalist’s questions about why they censored an article and then tried to refute it by promoting their own article’s narrative without even acknowledging the researched and sourced claims asserted in Isaac’s story.
