The following is a transcript of an interview with Jared Holt of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and Karen Kornbluh of the German Marshall Fund that aired Sunday, Sept. 4, 2022, on “Face the Nation.”
INTRO: Political violence and riots can often be traced back to the rise of online extremism. We spoke earlier with two experts on the problem and its potential solutions — Jared Holt, the senior research manager at the institute for strategic dialogue and Karen Kornbluh, the head of the German Marshall Fund’s Digital Innovations and Democracy Initiative — and we began by asking them to characterize the relationship between the internet and democracy.
JARED HOLT: Tenuous. The internet in the way that it is monetized in the current age is through attention, you can get a lot of attention saying crazy stuff and we’ve seen a lot of people do that, frankly. So you know, as long as the business model of the internet is built around trying to captivate audiences and keep them clicking, reacting, whether that’s through rage or diehard support. It’s going to be in conflict with democracy, because democracy is not about what gets the most attention. It’s supposed to be about, you know, what the best ideas are, how do we compromise? How do we move forward? In this attention-based economy online, is incongruent with that mission.
MAJOR GARRETT: Karen, complete this sentence: the internet’s relationship to democracy is?
KAREN KORNBLUH: Fraught, it’s definitely fraught, in the early days of the internet, it offered incredible promise, and it still does, you know, all of these movements, Black Lives Matter, Me Too, were able to gain steam online and that it just continues to offer the kind of promise of educating people, informing them, connecting them. But these algorithms really have contributed to the crisis we’re in. And the platforms have a real responsibility to fix them, and to help fix the problem that they’ve helped create.
MAJOR GARRETT: Jared, from a libertarian perspective, one might argue, look, people are out there, they decide what they want to consume, there is agency as you indicated, so the internet isn’t a problem. These people are out there. They have their beliefs, and they’re going to pursue it- or is it that you’re arguing the internet is an accelerator and a multiplier?
HOLT: It’s an accelerator and a multiplier, this kind of content, conspiratorial content, extremist movements have existed in America for as long as America has been around, right? These platforms are designed guiding people towards more extreme content, what they’re not taking down, what they’re giving a free pass to, people who are using these platforms to manipulate audiences, and guide them and steer them.
MAJOR GARRETT: From your perspective, is January 6, and it’s magnitude impossible without this multiplier accelerationist effect.
HOLT: It’s very safe to say that it wouldn’t have happened the way that it did, at the scale that it did coming together as fast as it did, without the internet. A lot of attention was paid to fringe platforms like Parlor, after the riot. But a lot of the agitation and calls to action were happening on mainstream platforms from mainstream figures.
MAJOR GARRETT: For those on the right, who say, you’re missing this whole point, the point is, we get canceled, we get de-platformed, and that’s big tech silencing us. So, our rights are the ones being trampled, you would say?
KORNBLUH: This is the danger of the whack a mole solution. Not only is it ineffective, too little too late, but it also raises all kinds of free expression concerns because it takes down content and takes down people after the fact. I’d love to see the platforms not only fix their algorithms, but when they publish their terms of service, really commit themselves to enforce what they’ve put out there, and not have so much discretion. It’s this kind of discretion that I think really bothers people and makes them feel that they can’t get on these very few opportunities for speech.
MAJOR GARRETT: Jared, what happened in these places you are describing Parler, Gettr, other parts of the web that maybe aren’t as well trafficked as others after the Mar a Lago execution of a search warrant?
HOLT: These spaces online, pro-Trump forums, fringe platforms, just really erupted with violent rhetoric. There’s these false beliefs that the FBI or law enforcement is out to get conservatives and Trump supporters specifically. But we saw that paired with also a lot of violent rhetoric, taking their existing beliefs that the system is compromised, and ratcheting it up to the next level, saying, you know, we need to do something, whether that’s protesting, or whether that’s taking it as far as that individual in Cincinnati did, trying to breach the FBI office there.
MAJOR GARRETT: Karen, what can Congress do?
KORNBLUH: There’s bipartisan concern, but there’s really not bipartisan action. The proposals on algorithmic accountability, I think, offer real promise, but so far, they don’t include any kind of enforcement mechanism. Given the tinderbox that we’re in, I think we really have to turn to the platforms and ask them to step up.
MAJOR GARRETT: What are you looking at in terms of these realities? They’re not going to change before the midterm elections and multiplier effects, accelerationist effect on the web, heading toward the midterms?
KORNBLUH: There are two things, two urgent things, that I would say that the platforms could do. First, they should stop siloing people, directing people into these bubbles that reinforce extremist worldviews and don’t let in opposing viewpoints. And second, they should really work with the providers of important civic information, people like election administration officials, to help them amplify accurate information so that people can be empowered and actually know what- what’s going on.
MAJOR GARRETT: What does this conversation and these underlying realities mean, as America grapples with what appears to be a rise in white nationalism, white supremacy?
HOLT: The internet has been a really powerful tool for extremist movements in the US, it’s been a big accelerant. It’s been a big boom. And we’ve seen consistently on platforms, you know, they all have kind of red lines, that content is not supposed to cross over, if it crosses over. If it’s, you know, particularly violent, particularly racist, that kind of material will get banned. But the content that walks right up to that line, that sort of tiptoes on that line, is among the highest performing content on these websites. It’s not a level playing field. And that unlevel playing field has been, you know, definitely an accelerant of these issues that we’re seeing rise up in American prominence. The kind of stuff that we’re talking about today, whether it’s misinformation, conspiracy theories, etc. Everybody is vulnerable to this. Rich people, poor people, smart people, not so smart people, everybody can fall victim to this stuff. And it has to do with the manipulative nature of the content. And I just think it’s really important to stress that.
