Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff issued a letter to major social media executives this week demanding they reveal how they will combat ‘misinformation’ and ‘disinformation’ in the 2024 election. 

The letter, co-signed by seven other members of Congress, accuses social media platforms such as X, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok of failing to properly prepare for malicious info-hazards in November. 

‘We write to your platforms as concerned Members of Congress, seeking further information about your preparation for and response to the spread of misinformation and disinformation, or the potential incitement of violence on your platforms leading up to the 2024 elections,’ the California congressman wrote. ‘We have already seen how posts with disinformation have spread on the major social media platforms both in the United States and across the globe during election cycles.’

The letter continued, ‘We continue to be concerned with each of your companies’ ability to react efficiently and effectively to misinformation and disinformation, or to any potential incitement of violence occurring on your platforms.’

In the letter, the signers accused social platforms Meta, Discord, and Snap specifically of ‘[reducing] their elections team dramatically’ following the 2022 elections.

X, Meta, and TikTok were singled out and scolded for having ‘not increased their transparency for external groups who can aid in monitoring election information.’

READ THE FULL LETTER — APP USERS CLICK HERE

‘While the impetus of this letter is the 2024 election, political and election-related mis- and disinformation persists even between elections, so we are also urging your companies to commit to taking action on election and political misinformation year-round, not just in the leadup to elections.’

A series of specific questions are offered at the end of the letter, including ‘Will your company be changing your election integrity policies between now and the 2024 U.S. general election?’ and ‘How will your company be more transparent in enforcement of its community guidelines regarding election integrity and transparent with the public about actions it has taken?’

‘Will your company commit to sharing data and metrics on the effectiveness of your enforcement systems in relation to US elections and political speech?’ the Democratic congress members asked. ‘How will your company address mis- and disinformation made by political actors or verified accounts, and how will they be treated differently, if at all, compared to ordinary users?’

The letter was co-signed by Democratic Representatives Julia Brownley of California, Andre Carson of Indiana, Dan Goldman of New York, Robert Garcia of California, Raúl M. Grijalva of Arizona, Hank Johnson of Georgia and Doris Matsui of California.

It was addressed to the following executives: Mark Zuckerberg, Meta; Linda Yaccarino, X; Shou Zi Chew, TikTok; Sundar Pichai, Google; Adam Mosseri, Instagram; Evan Spiegel, Snap; Neal Mohan, YouTube; Satya Nadella, Microsoft.

Former first lady Melania Trump is drawing heat from pro-life advocates over an excerpt in her memoir where she suggests a woman’s right to choose an abortion is a ‘fundamental right of individual liberty,’ according to a report Wednesday.

Melania Trump wife of Republican presidential candidate and former President Trump, wrote the memoir entitled ‘Melania’ that is scheduled to come out on Oct. 8, per the Amazon release date. In the book, according to a preview by The Guardian, Melania expresses a viewpoint that has historically been at odds with the Republican Party’s platform. 

‘It is imperative to guarantee that women have autonomy in deciding their preference of having children, based on their own convictions, free from any intervention or pressure from the government,’ Melania reportedly wrote.

‘Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body? A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.

‘Restricting a woman’s right to choose whether to terminate an unwanted pregnancy is the same as denying her control over her own body. I have carried this belief with me throughout my entire adult life.’

The excerpts quickly drew the ire of pro-life advocates who have already been disgruntled by some of Trump’s seemingly ambiguous comments regarding abortion. 

‘Melania Trump’s support of abortion is anti-feminist and clearly outside the teaching of our Catholic faith. She is wrong,’ wrote Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America advocacy group. 

Lila Rose, founder of leading pro-life advocacy group Live Action, also responded to a promotional video Melania posted for her memoir in which she states, ‘Individual freedom is a fundamental principle that I safeguard… what does my body my choice really mean?’

‘Who is this Melania Trump, or Kamala Harris? Functionally the same exact position on abortion,’ Rose wrote on X. 

President of pro-life advocacy group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, Marjorie Dannenfelser, wrote on X: ‘The women of America are capable of great strength and creativity. They are naturally inclined to speak for those who are powerless. Abortion is not the source of their freedom and liberation.’

In August, Trump sparked confusion among pro-life supporters about where he stood on an amendment that would upend Florida’s ban on abortions after six weeks’ gestation. Trump, after saying ‘I think the six-week is too short, there has to be more time,’ to an NBC reporter when asked how he would vote, later walked it back and said he would vote against the amendment.

Other spouses of Republican presidents, such as Pat Nixon, Betty Ford, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush and Laura Bush, have been recorded either during or after their husbands’ tenure in office expressing pro-choice views.

Trump has also said he opposes a nationwide abortion ban and the GOP’s official platform softened its language about its abortion stances this year.

Fox News Digital has reached out to Melania Trump’s office for comment but did not hear back by publication deadline.

Second gentleman Doug Emhoff denied the veracity of a Daily Mail report in which three unnamed sources accused him of having slapped a former girlfriend during a 2012 trip to the Cannes Film Festival.

Fox News Digital has not been able to independently confirm the allegations.

‘This report is untrue,’ an unnamed representative for Vice President Kamala Harris’ husband told news outlet Semafor. ‘Any suggestion that he would or has ever hit a woman is false.’

The Daily Mail’s exclusive story on Tuesday quoted a trio of unidentified sources who claim Emhoff slapped his then-girlfriend while the couple waited in a valet line following an event in Nice, France, in 2012. The alleged altercation was purportedly sparked when the woman — identified only by the pseudonym ‘Jane’ and described as a successful New York attorney — flirted with a valet, according to the article.

The Harris campaign, the Office of the Vice President and a representative for Emhoff’s ex-wife, Kerstin Emhoff, did not comment despite repeated requests from Fox News. 

Several media outlets, including Semafor, noted they had been unable to match the Daily Mail’s reporting, and legacy media companies such as The New York Times have yet to report on the claims. 

The Daily Mail’s article hinged on the recollections of three people described as being Jane’s friends. The outlet said its sources requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation from Emhoff. The three friends reportedly provided the outlet with a photo of the pair when they were still a couple, as well as itineraries and correspondence between Emhoff and Jane to substantiate that they made the trip to France in May 2012.

One of the sources is described by the Daily Mail as a female New York attorney who learned about the alleged incident from Jane.

‘He hauled up and slapped her so hard she spun around,’ the source is quoted as saying. ‘She said she was in utter shock. She was so furious, she slapped him on one side, and then on the other cheek with the other hand.’

Another friend, described by the Daily Mail as a New York businessman, told the outlet Jane called him sobbing following the alleged incident. 

‘It was very clear what she was telling me,’ that source said, according to the Daily Mail. ‘She said she was with a guy, her date, she was at the Cannes Film Festival, and he hit her. She was in the car with the guy at the time.’

The male friend said he learned more details about the alleged episode after the initial phone call. 

‘It was something like 3 a.m. They were trying to get out of there and they both had been drinking. There was a gigantic line for taxis,’ he told the outlet. ‘She went up to one of the valet guys, offered him 100 euros or whatever, to get to the head of the line. She told me she put her hand on his shoulder. Doug apparently thought that she was flirting, and came over and slapped her in the face.’

A third friend, described as a female executive, told the Daily Mail that she learned of the alleged incident in 2014, and purportedly found out new details from Jane in 2018, when Harris, then a senator from California, made headlines with her questioning of a Supreme Court nominee who had been accused of sexual assault.

‘[She] is a gorgeous, strong woman and you would never expect somebody to hit her,’ the third friend told the Daily Mail. ‘When he hit her she hit him back, like, ‘Don’t you ever do that again.”

The third Daily Mail source added: ‘I asked her if he ever apologized. She said ‘no,’ but he commented about the hit she gave him. It was a tennis metaphor. But no apology at all.’

All three friends told the outlet that Jane hit Emhoff back after the alleged initial slap. They also claimed that Jane tried to leave the valet area after the alleged slap, but that Emhoff got into a cab with Jane.

Jane and Emhoff had been dating for about three months before the reported trip to France, according to the friends. Emhoff allegedly cut the trip short and returned to the U.S. for his daughter’s birthday at the end of May, and never saw Jane again, the friends told the outlet. 

Emhoff’s alleged relationship with Jane unfolded after his 2008 divorce from his first wife and before his 2014 marriage to Harris. 

The New York Post on Wednesday slammed Emhoff as ‘Worst Gentleman’ in its cover story detailing the Daily Mail’s article.

Emhoff is fresh off of a Sunday sit-down interview on MSNBC during which host Jen Psaki celebrated him as having reshaped ‘the perception of masculinity.’

‘There is also an important, interesting part about how people have talked about your role is how your role has reshaped the perception of masculinity,’ Psaki said. ‘I’m not sure you planned on that, but you are an incredibly supportive spouse. Has that been an evolution for you? Do you think that’s part of the role you might play as first gentleman?’

Emhoff responded: ‘It’s funny. I’ve started to think a lot about this. I’ve always been like this. My dad’s always been like this. To me, it’s the right thing to do, support women. It is mutual with Kamala and I. We support each other, we have each other’s back.’

He added: ‘I’ve said many times when we lift up women, we support women, whether it’s pay equity, child care, family leave, and all of these issues in this post-Dobbs hellscape. Women should not be less than. Women should not have less rights and be treated differently. That’s not the American way.’

Clips of the exchange spread like wildfire on social media as critics noted that, in August, Emhoff admitted to having an affair with his family’s nanny during his first marriage years ago.

Emhoff’s admission came shortly after the Daily Mail published a separate report in August claiming that he got his daughter’s nanny pregnant.

The affair occurred before Emhoff’s relationship with and eventual marriage to Harris. 

‘During my first marriage, Kerstin and I went through some tough times on account of my actions. I took responsibility, and in the years since, we worked through things as a family and have come out stronger on the other side,’ Emhoff said over the summer, acknowledging the affair, but not naming the nanny. 

Emhoff and his first wife were married from 1992 to 2008 and share two adult children. Harris married Emhoff in 2014, and helped co-parent his children, who call their stepmom ‘mommala.’ 

Emhoff reportedly told Jane in 2012 about his divorce, according to her female friend who works as an executive. 

The Daily Mail’s report was published just five weeks before the election, when Harris will square off against former President Trump at the ballot box. 

More than 400 national security and foreign policy officials, ex-Cabinet members, retired military officers and Gold Star families endorsed former President Trump on Thursday.

In an open letter organized by former National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien and former NSC Chief of Staff Alex Gray, the signatories condemn the ‘repeated failures’ of the Biden-Harris administration’s foreign policy and urged Americans to re-elect Trump.

‘From a world at peace under President Trump, we are closer to a third world war than ever before under the Biden-Harris Administration,’ the letter states. ‘With multiple escalating wars around the world, an open border that allows terrorists to flood into the American homeland, and malign actors like China operating unabated, U.S. national security has been profoundly damaged by the failed policies of Kamala Harris and Joe Biden.’

The endorsement was signed by several prominent officials from the Trump administration, including former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Attorney General Bill Barr, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and former 2024 Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, and many more.

Eleven family members of the 13 American troops killed at Abbey Gate at Kabul’s airport during the 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan also signed the letter, which praised Trump’s foreign policy record in contrast to Biden’s controversial actions. 

‘When President Trump took office, the war in Afghanistan had dragged on for almost 16 years. By February 2020, a peace agreement was reached, ensuring no American soldier was killed in combat until the end of the Trump Administration. This agreement held strong because the Taliban understood President Trump’s resolve and U.S. forces were prepared to ensure their compliance,’ the letter reads.

‘The botched withdrawal from Afghanistan under the Biden-Harris Administration in 2021, led to the unnecessary deaths of thirteen brave American troops at Abbey Gate and left untold billions of dollars of high grade military equipment to the Taliban, making it the most well-armed terror organization in the world.’

Additionally, 40 retired U.S. ambassadors, 75 retired senior military officers and several hundred officials from previous Republican administrations signed the letter, praising Trump’s diplomatic efforts on cease-fire agreements between Turkey and Kurdish fighters in Syria and the Abraham Accords. The letter refers to Trump as a ‘peacemaker.’ 

‘Securing peace is in the greatest tradition of American foreign policy and the Judeo-Christian principles upon which our nation was founded,’ the letter continues before quoting from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew. ‘Jesus said, ‘blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be sons of God.’ (Matthew 5:9) Such is the legacy of the Trump Administration.’

Writing on X, O’Brien said he was ‘honored’ to join his colleagues from the Trump administration in ‘supporting a return to a ‘peace through strength’ foreign policy under President Trump.’

Another signatory, Dr. Jerry Hendrix, former director of the Secretary of the Navy’s Advisory Panel, said it ‘wasn’t a hard decision’ to attach his name to the letter.

‘Trump had 1 of the more successful foreign policy presidencies since the Cold War,’ Hendrix wrote on X. ‘He ended sequestration. He invested in the Navy. The Biden-Harris admin has been one foreign policy debacle after another.’ 

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.