On September 17, 2024, Facebook flagged conservative media outlet The Federalist’s coverage of an incident involving Haitian migrants allegedly slaughtering geese in Springfield, Ohio, as “false information.”
This action was based on a “fact check” by Lead Stories.
Lead Stories, a group funded by tech elites in Silicon Valley and China, conducts fact-checking for platforms like Facebook and ByteDance’s TikTok.
Meta and ByteDance pay Lead Stories to verify claims on their platforms, and stories labeled false are suppressed in users’ feeds.
Facebook posted a warning under the article, cautioning that “people who repeatedly share false information might have their posts moved lower in News Feed so other people are less likely to see them.”
The Federalist story included an audio recording of a phone call to law enforcement in which a Springfield resident reported seeing four Haitian migrants carrying geese near the city’s downtown.
The caller explained, “I’m going to my job orientation today, and I see a group of Haitian people, there was about four of them, they all had geese in their hand… I saw that, and I’m like, ‘Yeah, this has got to be reported.’”
The Lead Stories fact check criticized the Federalist article for suggesting that the audio confirmed the accuracy of the caller’s report.
“While the audio confirms that a call was made, it does not prove that what was reported truly happened,” the fact-checkers stated.
They pointed out that the caller described four Haitians carrying geese and getting into a gray Toyota Tacoma but did not clarify whether the geese were alive or dead, domestic or wild.
The article also referenced a statement from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) which legacy media outlets used to downplay claims about Haitian migrants hunting geese.
Although ODNR acknowledged a second report of a similar incident in March, they noted that “no supporting evidence was found of wildlife being illegally removed from the park in either case.”
Tristan Justice of The Federalist emphasized that the lack of evidence doesn’t necessarily mean the incidents didn’t happen, noting that in both cases, the suspects had already left the scene when law enforcement arrived.
Additionally, these reports surfaced before Springfield gained national attention for dealing with an influx of migrants.
There appears to be an effort to censor the events unfolding in Springfield, Ohio. While there may be inaccuracies in how these incidents are reported, the broader point remains: this situation is seen by some as part of a larger immigration issue affecting Middle America.
The migrants, portrayed as culturally incompatible with the “Historic American Nation,” are viewed by some as part of a demographic shift facilitated by the political elite.
According to this narrative, migrant groups from the Global South, including Haitians, do not belong in the United States, regardless of their legal status.
The author concludes that if Donald Trump emphasizes these concerns in his campaign, it could significantly boost his electoral chances.
