Social media company Rumble clashes with Pa. Democrats over antisemitism, defamation allegations

Rising concerns over global antisemitism are spilling over into a dispute between a right-wing social media platform called Rumble and some members of Pennsylvania’s Democratic Party.

Letters obtained by TribLive show Rumble, a Toronto-based social media company, sparring with the Pennsylvania Democratic Party. One side claims that Rumble is abetting antisemitism. The other counters that Pennsylvania Democrats are using defamatory and false rhetoric in criticism of the company.

Rumble, a social media company akin to YouTube, describes itself as “on a mission to protect a free and open internet” and designed for “people who believe in authentic expression.” In late March, its lawyers sent a cease-and-desist letter to the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, claiming that a press conference with state Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, included false and defamatory statements made against the platform.

The claims

Frankel criticized Rumble during a press conference in Harrisburg with state Democrats. He said that Rumble welcomed white supremacists and conspiracy theorists to its platform after they were ousted by YouTube. He also denounced David McCormick, the Pennsylvania Republican running for U.S. Senate, for investing over $1 million in Rumble.

Rumble, through its lawyer, said if the state Democrats refuse to make correcting statements about its claims against the platform, it could face “substantial liability.”

In an interview with TribLive, Frankel defended his criticism against Rumble and said being threatened with legal action by the company is “disgraceful.”

Frankel, who is Jewish, said the recent rise in antisemitism worries him. He recalled when users on the right-wing social media site Gab attacked him and Gov. Josh Shapiro, who also is Jewish. He said that when he discovered another conservative social media site was growing in popularity, he felt compelled to speak out in March to share his concerns.

“As a Jewish lawmaker who represents the neighborhood that suffered the worst antisemitic attack in American history, I will never stop speaking out about antisemitic content,” Frankel told TribLive, referring to the 2018 attack at Tree of Life.

The feud adds another layer to Pennsylvania’s political campaigns, as antisemitism has become one of the biggest wedge issues. College protests, the ongoing Israel/Hamas war, instances of antisemitic vandalism, and the scars of white supremacist violence are still fresh in the minds of voters.

McCormick has repeatedly attempted to discredit Sen. Bob Casey, his Democratic rival, saying that Casey has not strongly stood up to antisemitism. Casey, meanwhile, has spent much of the campaign boosting his efforts to combat antisemitism by pushing for new federal protections, and telling voters that he and his party are true protectors of civil rights.

Potential legal fight

The Rumble feud stems from a March press conference in Harrisburg where Democrats, including Frankel, criticized the social media platform as antisemitism and hate speech were on the rise throughout the country.

Rumble’s founder and CEO, Chris Pavlovski, describes the platform as “immune to cancel culture.” Prominent right-wing personalities like Donald Trump Jr. and fringe conservative Russell Brand can be found on the site, which attracted 50 million users in the first quarter of this year. While growing, the figure pales in comparison to its mainstream competitor YouTube, which has about 2.7 billion monthly users.

Controversial media figure and alt-right activist Nick Fuentes also has a page on Rumble, where he shares a video making antisemitic claims that Jews run the media and complains about people criticizing Nazis. He also laments social media content-moderation on other platforms and explains the hardships of locating a video online of rapper Kanye West praising Hitler.

Fuentes was banned from YouTube in 2020.

Rumble also hosts videos of interviews with Bishop Richard N. Williamson, a controversial religious figure from England. In these interviews, Williamson denies the Holocaust and claims Jews are seeking world domination.

Elizabeth Locke, Rumble’s lawyer, wrote in the March 29 cease-and-desist letter that Pennsylvania Democrats’ assertions that Rumble has no rules or content moderation are false. She wrote the party’s claims that Rumble promotes and encourages racist, antisemitic and dangerous content are also untrue and defamatory.

Rumble is “proudly content-neutral,” she wrote, but has content policies that are easily accessible.

The company’s website said terms and conditions for use include prohibiting content that is pornographic, promotes terrorist organizations as deemed by Canadian and U.S. governments, promotes groups that incite violence such as “Antifa, the KKK and white supremacist groups,” and content that is deemed grossly offensive to the online community, including but not limited to racism, antisemitism and hatred.

“While the Pennsylvania Democratic Party is free to disagree with Rumble’s policy of content neutrality and its unapologetically pro-speech mission, it is not free to facilitate the publication and dissemination of statements of fact about Rumble it knew to be false when they were made,” wrote Locke. She has garnered a track record as a libel lawyer, including winning an injunction for the conservative group Project Veritas against The New York Times and securing a settlement and apology from the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Neither Rumble nor Locke responded to requests for comment for this story.

The Pennsylvania Democratic Party responded with an April 29 letter from its lawyers at the Washington-based Elias Law Group. The letter said Rumble is mischaracterizing the party’s statements about the company and said it was hypocritical for a self-described “unapologetically pro-free speech” platform.

“Rumble cannot scare the Pennsylvania Democratic Party into silencing itself about these important issues,” reads an April 29 letter from Elias Law Firm.

Unlikely lawsuit

Paul Barrett is the deputy director of the New York University’s Stern Center for Business and Human Rights and author of multiple reports on social media companies. He said a potential defamation lawsuit from Rumble against the Pennsylvania Democrats is unlikely to succeed.

He said the Democrats should have plenty of First Amendment protections in any legal action.

“Rumble is not talking about puppies and Little League. They have their views, and they have a right to express their views,” Barrett said. “And other people have a right to criticize them for their views.”

He said a lawsuit or legal threat is likely a win-win for Rumble anyway, as it signals to its right-wing users that it is fighting on their behalf.

“Rumble has nothing to lose,” Barrett said. “They are only drawing attention that they are in a never-ending partisan war, and that is the atmosphere in which they thrive.”

Barrett said platforms like Rumble are responding to demand in the marketplace, particularly among conservative users who are frustrated with content moderation on mainstream platforms.

He said conservative politicians and figures invest in places like Rumble because these sites promote their ideology and there is an opportunity to make a profit, even if not as large as through mainstream platforms.

“The potential to make a ton of money with these platforms is limited, and that is in significant part because advertisers are wary of the platforms. It doesn’t mean that it won’t make any money,” Barrett said. “Another reason to invest is ideological. They agree with the opinions shared on the site, and they want a place to promote them.”

Spilling into Senate campaign

The legal threat comes as state Democrats are attempting to tie Republican Senate candidate David McCormick to Rumble.

According to candidate financial disclosures filed in September 2023, McCormick is holding between $1 million and $5 million of stock in Rumble. J.D. Vance, before he became a Republican U.S. senator for Ohio, and conservative venture capitalist Peter Thiel led a group that made a significant investment in Rumble in 2021, as reported by The Wall Street Journal.

The site grew tenfold following former President Donald Trump’s 2020 presidential election loss, and has only grown since then. The market capitalization of the company today is around $2.2 billion.

Rumble has since come under investigation from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, reported Wired in January, but it is unclear why the platform is being looked into.

Frankel said McCormick should be ashamed of his investment in the platform.

Mitch Kates, executive director of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, said McCormick must be held accountable for Rumble’s content because he is profiting off of the investment.

“We won’t be scared into silence by a site that offers a platform for those spewing antisemitic beliefs,” Kates said. “At the end of the day, David McCormick profits off his millions of dollars of investments in this website and must be held accountable for its content.”

The McCormick campaign did not respond to requests for comment.

Both he and Casey, the incumbent, have been jockeying for who can stand strongest against antisemitism in a new period of heightened tensions.

Protests on college campuses have reignited debate over the Israel/Hamas war. The protests across the country, including at the University of Pittsburgh, occupied campus spaces and called on college administrators to divest from Israel and accused the Israeli government of genocide against Palestinians.

Critics have labeled the protest as antisemitic and Jewish students have decried ongoing safety concerns they have experienced near the protest camps and overall since the war began last October.

McCormick has condemned the recent protests at Pitt and other Pennsylvania campuses. He visited the University of Pennsylvania protest encampment in May, decrying the pro-Palestine protesters and claiming they were creating a hostile environment for Jewish students.

He also claimed that President Joe Biden and Casey lacked the proper leadership skills to stop the protests.

Last week, a Jewish volunteer for the McCormick campaign said he was assaulted by pro-Palestinian protesters at an encampment on Pitt’s campus.

McCormick lamented the incident, writing on X that “this antisemitism is disgusting” and calling on Casey to “stand up and defend his Jewish constituents.”

One of my great volunteers was attacked by pro-Hamas supporters on Pitt's campus.

He’s a Jewish student who was wearing a McCormick hat & proudly waving the American flag.

This antisemitism is disgusting. Bob Casey needs to stand up & defend his Jewish constituents. pic.twitter.com/zMkbrDZxnh

— Dave McCormick (@DaveMcCormickPA) June 4, 2024

The Casey campaign did not respond for a request for comment for this story.

Casey, a Democrat from Scranton, said at a May stop in Pittsburgh that campus protests can still be places of “robust free speech” but not if they become hostile environments for Jewish students or other students.

He has co-sponsored the Antisemitism Awareness Act, a bill that details certain on-campus speech and behavior as discriminatory under federal law. He has sponsored the bill in some form since 2016, and recently reaffirmed his support and said protections should even go beyond that bill.