Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales
In October, Facebook made the controversial decision to exempt most political ads from fact-checking. The announcement met with a swift backlash, particularly among leading Democratic candidates for president. As criticism mounted, Facebook began to hint that it would further refine its policy to address lawmakers’ concerns. One change that seemed likely was to limit the ability of candidates to use the company’s sophisticated targeting tools, particularly after hundreds of employees wrote an open letter to Mark Zuckerberg asking for it.
On Thursday, Facebook unveiled the refinements to its policy that it had been promising. But restrictions on targeting were nowhere to be found. Instead, the company doubled down on its current policy,…