Angelo Carusone speaks to Oregon's KGW about social media platforms driving real-world threats of violence and voter intimidation
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From the November 2, 2020, edition of KGW's The Story with Dan Haggerty
CRISTIN SEVERANCE (KGW INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER): Angelo Carusone is the CEO of Media Matters, a nonprofit media watchdog organization. The left-leaning group monitors 55,000 hours of TV, radio, and digital streams and social media. He said it's not just the presences of these groups that's conerning. It's their messages on social media that can sometimes lead to real-world consequences. His example: The never-ending stream of false claims Antifa started the Oregon wildfires. They didn't.
ANGELO CARUSONE (MEDIA MATTERS PRESIDENT AND CEO): You started to see false reports that it was antifa that was starting wildfires and that of course led to a response from sort of a few, but sort of right-wing individuals who then startde to feel like they needed to come out armed to defend themselves. And the reason that is a relevant example here is that the exact same thing we're seeing as it relates to the election, which is that these, you know, false reports of malfeasance in the vote counts or maybe Black Lives Matters or Antifa or the Democrats are going to steal it. Therefore you have to go and defend the results of the election by showing up or preparing to show up and show up armed.