ADF to Facebook: Practice what you preach, allow free speech
ADF sends letter to Meta after pro-life accounts are suspended for ‘exploitation’
MENLO PARK, Calif. – On behalf of pro-life news site LifeNews.com, LifeNews CEO and editor Steven Ertelt, and potential adoptive mom Abby Covington, Alliance Defending Freedom sent a letter Wednesday to Meta after it wrongly suspended Ertelt, LifeNews.com, and Covington’s Facebook and Instagram accounts. ADF attorneys explain that Meta’s content-moderation mechanisms are either deeply flawed or its standards against “human exploitation” and “child sexual exploitation” were weaponized to suspend the accounts for promoting pro-life beliefs.
As the letter explains, LifeNews, which reaches more than 750,000 individuals weekly through its website, e-mails, radio programs, and social media accounts, has an Instagram account with over 20,000 followers. Ertelt—who has nearly 5,000 friends on his personal account—used his Facebook to repost content from LifeNews. Covington, who used Facebook as a primary source for her small business to reach customers, created a Facebook and Instagram page chronicling her family’s journey toward adoption. Both Ertelt and Covington tried to log in to their Facebook accounts shortly after sharing pro-life posts and were locked out with no warning. After they tried to appeal multiple times, Meta permanently banned their Facebook and Instagram accounts. Because Ertelt operated LifeNews’s Instagram account, Meta permanently banned that account as well.
“Although Meta recently restated its commitment to upholding free speech on its platforms, it has a long way to go to prove that it will actually make good on its promises,” said ADF Senior Counsel Phil Sechler, director of the ADF Center for Free Speech. “Steven Ertelt, Abby Covington, and LifeNews all used their social media in family-friendly and life-affirming ways. But the social media giant silenced them for reasons that are patently absurd. Until Facebook restores these accounts, its statements on free speech ring hollow.”
“Facebook’s censorship of my account and our Instagram account is absurd,” said Ertelt. “Calling a medical video demonstrating the humanity of unborn children ‘child sexual exploitation’ is grossly inaccurate and offensive to the millions of pro-life people who use Facebook and Instagram. Instead of going after a pro-life video and disabling our accounts, it should crack down on actual child sexual exploitation.”
In May, Ertelt shared a LifeNews.com post that included a video of a cesarean section with a caption that read, “An unborn baby can’t be just a clump of cells when he or she is grabbing the doctor’s hand.” The post garnered significant traction, but when Ertelt tried to log in to his account later that day, he learned his account was suspended for “child sexual exploitation.” LifeNews also used Ertelt’s account to create its Instagram page, and as a result, that page is unavailable until Facebook restores Ertelt’s account.
Similarly, Covington created a page called “Austin & Abby Adopt—Covington Family Adoption Journey,” which was dedicated to her and her husband’s religious commitment and conviction that all human life is precious and worth protecting. In November, Covington used her page to introduce her family and reach out to pregnant mothers making an adoption plan. Shortly after her post, online trolls harassed her for her religious beliefs and commitment to pro-life ideals. She deleted the post, but Facebook later deleted her entire account, citing a violation of its “human exploitation” standards. Without her Facebook account, Covington is unable to access her adoption page as well as her small business page.
ADF’s letter explains that these account suspensions create a significant violation of Meta’s own free speech standards, as well as a loss of finances for Ertelt, LifeNews, and Covington. The letter outlines how Meta unlawfully induces users to its platforms with promises of fairness but applies its Terms of Service in faulty and inconsistent ways—ways which Meta officials have openly acknowledged.
“Mr. Ertelt, LifeNews, and Mrs. Covington reasonably expected that their accounts would be safe from suspension so long as they abided by Meta’s Terms of Service and Community Standards,” the letter states. “But unknown to them, Meta’s promise was unreliable, and they have each suffered financially as a result.”
- Pronunciation guide: Sechler (SECK’-lur)
Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.
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ABOUT Philip A. Sechler
Philip A. Sechler serves as senior counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, where he focuses on academic and religious freedom. Before joining ADF, Sechler had a long career in private practice, with substantial first-chair trial experience in courts around the country on a variety of complex litigation matters. He was also a Distinguished Visitor from Practice at Penn State Law School, where he spent four years teaching. He also taught at the Antonin Scalia School of Law at George Mason University and at the Georgetown University Law Center, where he continues to teach a course on Professional Responsibility. Sechler received his bachelor’s degree with high distinction from Pennsylvania State University, and he earned his Juris Doctor from Georgetown University Law Center, where he graduated summa cum laude and was Editor-in-Chief of The Georgetown Law Journal. Following law school, he clerked for the Honorable Francis D. Murnaghan, Jr., of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit. Sechler is admitted to practice before the District of Columbia and Virginia bars, as well as the U.S. Supreme Court and numerous federal appellate and trial courts.