Chairman Jordan Presses Stanford on Subpoena Compliance for Censorship Investigation

Press Release

"The Committee on the Judiciary is conducting oversight of how and to what extent the Executive Branch has coerced or colluded with companies and other intermediaries to censor lawful speech. As a part of this oversight, on April 12, 2023, after efforts to obtain the voluntary compliance of your client, Stanford University, the Committee issued a subpoena for relevant documents to the Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO), with a return date of April 28, 2023. Your client's compliance with the subpoena to date is insufficient, and the Committee writes to note its concerns.

The Committee is aware of evidence that suggests that the SIO is involved in the censorship of disfavored speech. Notably, SIO is a member of the Election Integrity Partnership (EIP) and the Virality Project (VP), which used Atlassian's Jira Service Desk to file "tickets' for alleged mis- and disinformation. The final summary reports issued by EIP and VP in 2021 and 2022 regarding the 2020 election and COVID-19 vaccines, respectively, state that individuals affiliated with SIO tracked both specific posts and entire "narratives' through the Jira ticketing system and shared them, at a minimum, with large social media companies. Public and non- public information obtained by the Committee confirms that large social media companies moderated content based upon these tickets and other information shared by Stanford personnel. For example, EIP boasted that "Twitter, Google, Facebook, and TikTok all had a 75% or higher response rate (on the EIP Jira ticketing platform) to tickets they were tagged in.'

The Committee's subpoena requires the production of "[a]ll documents and communications between or among the SIO and any company referring or relating to . . . the accuracy or truth of content[.]' This request includes all Jira tickets and related communications to social media companies, which document purportedly false content posted online. In spite of this requirement, your client has thus far refused to provide documents and communications related to the Jira tickets despite repeated, specific requests from the Committee to do so. Further, during a recent call with Committee staff, you confirmed that your client has possession of documents and communications related to the Jira tickets, but would not be producing them to the Committee. You have represented that the basis for your refusal is that these documents and communications concern only a research project conducted by Stanford students. This description is inconsistent with information obtained by the Committee and available in the public domain, which suggests that the government and large social media platforms initiated and received information via these relevant documents.

The Committee's subpoena imposes legal obligations on SIO to comply and produce responsive materials. Thus, your client's refusal to produce documents responsive to the Committee's subpoena--four weeks after the subpoena return date--is highly concerning. Accordingly, the Committee expects the SIO will complete its production of responsive documents, in full, by no later than Wednesday, June 14, 2023, at 5:00 p.m. If Stanford fails to comply in full with the subpoena's demands, the Committee may be forced to consider the use of one or more enforcement mechanisms. Thank you for your client's attention to this matter."

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