Hundreds of unhappy Facebook employees stage a virtual protest

Some Facebook employees critical of CEO Mark Zuckerberg protested his decision not to do anything about incendiary posts that President Trump had placed on the giant social media platform over the past week.

Many of the employees, added an automated message to their digital profiles and email responses saying that they were out of the office in a show of protest. The protest group — conducting a virtual “walkout” of sorts since most Facebook employees are working from home because of the coronavirus pandemic — was one of a number of clusters of employees pressing Facebook executives to take a tougher stand on Mr. Trump’s posts.

Inside the company, staff members have circulated petitions and threatened to resign, and a number of employees wrote publicly about their unhappiness on Twitter and elsewhere. More than a dozen current and former employees have described the unrest as the most serious challenge to the leadership of Mark Zuckerberg since the company's inception 15 years ago.

Mr. Zuckerberg has argued on a number of occasions that Facebook should take a hands-off approach to what people post, including lies from elected officials and others in power. He has repeatedly said the public should be allowed to decide what to believe.

That stand was tested last week when Twitter added fact-check and warning labels to two tweets from the president that broke Twitter’s rules around voter suppression and glorification of violence. But as Twitter acted on Mr. Trump’s tweets, Facebook left his posts on its platform alone. Mr. Zuckerberg said Mr. Trump’s posts did not violate the social network’s rules.