News Opinons Politics

Daily Beast Says Facebook Helped Them Dox Trump Supporter

The Daily Beast recently doxed a black forklift driver and reported Trump supporter for the alleged high crime of creating a parody video of Democrat speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi. But there’s more to the story — it appears Facebook may have helped the left-wing journalists identify him.

The Daily Beast identified the video creator as Shawn Brooks, whom they described as a forklift driver and Trump supporter from the Bronx.

A Twitter account claiming to be Brooks disputed key details of the story, claiming he is not a Trump supporter, did not create the parody video, and does not live in the Bronx.


By doxing Brooks, The Daily Beast followed the example of CNN, which threatened to unmask an anonymous Trump supporter over a parody video, forcing to him apologize in exchange for not revealing his identity. The scandal caused “CNNBlackmail” to trend on Twitter.

But there’s another aspect to the Daily Beast story which has major implications for the privacy of Facebook users — according to the Daily Beast reporter himself, Facebook gave him information on Brooks’ activity on the platform.


Santa with CCW gets pulled over, tells Ohio deputy ‘you got to protect yourself’ during festive traffic stop
Nonprofit uses underwater technology to search for missing service members
Fox News ‘Antisemitism Exposed’ Newsletter: UN bigot out at Georgetown
Kim Jong Un swipes at South Korea’s progress building a nuclear submarine while inspecting his own
Poll: Young Protestants Are Officially Outnumbered by the ‘Nones’
Wild Christmas Miracle: Watch a Bona Fide Miracle in Real Time as Skydiver Gets Caught on Plane, Plummets, then Manages to Cheat Death
Biden nearly invisible in own Christmas family photo as Hunter takes center stage
5 Things the GOP Needs to Change to Win the 2026 Midterms
Lawmakers attempt to tackle NIL, giving it the ‘old college try’
LA Garbage Crisis Is So Bad One Man Quit His Job to Pick Up the City’s Slack
And We Thought Fruitcake Was Bad: Italian Company Is 3D Printing ‘Pastries’ That Are Made of Truly Gross-Sounding Ingredients
Migrant truckers sue California DMV over canceled commercial drivers’ licenses
An Elderly Customer Never Missed a Lunch or Dinner for 10 Years – When He Didn’t Show Up, the Chef Hopped in His Car and Ended Up Saving His Life
‘Shop With a Cop’ Sends Less Fortunate Kids on Mini Christmas Shopping Sprees With New Police Pals
The iciest moments of 2025: The 5 political feuds that froze Washington
See also  Proceedings paused against ‘Zizian’ murder suspect following competency claims

Via the Daily Beast:

It’s conceivable that someone else actually edited the clip. But a Facebook official, confirming a Daily Beast investigation, said the video was first posted on Politics WatchDog directly from Brooks’ personal Facebook account. [emphasis ours]

If the Daily Beast’s description of Facebook’s actions is accurate, Facebook compromised the privacy of one of its users, handing over information on his activity to a journalist who was clearly engaged in a politically motivated hatchet-job.

Facebook has been rocked by repeated privacy scandals over the past two years, including giving major corporations access to user data without permission. CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently unveiled a re-branding effort emphasizing the company’s commitment to protecting the privacy of its users.

“I believe that the future is private,” Zuckerberg said at a recent Facebook conference.

Even left-wing feminist Caroline Orr, who described the Pelosi parody as “disgusting” (it’s simply a video of Pelosi slowed down to make her words appear slurred), expressed shock at the idea of Facebook handing over private information about its users.


Santa with CCW gets pulled over, tells Ohio deputy ‘you got to protect yourself’ during festive traffic stop
Nonprofit uses underwater technology to search for missing service members
Fox News ‘Antisemitism Exposed’ Newsletter: UN bigot out at Georgetown
Kim Jong Un swipes at South Korea’s progress building a nuclear submarine while inspecting his own
Poll: Young Protestants Are Officially Outnumbered by the ‘Nones’
Wild Christmas Miracle: Watch a Bona Fide Miracle in Real Time as Skydiver Gets Caught on Plane, Plummets, then Manages to Cheat Death
Biden nearly invisible in own Christmas family photo as Hunter takes center stage
5 Things the GOP Needs to Change to Win the 2026 Midterms
Lawmakers attempt to tackle NIL, giving it the ‘old college try’
LA Garbage Crisis Is So Bad One Man Quit His Job to Pick Up the City’s Slack
And We Thought Fruitcake Was Bad: Italian Company Is 3D Printing ‘Pastries’ That Are Made of Truly Gross-Sounding Ingredients
Migrant truckers sue California DMV over canceled commercial drivers’ licenses
An Elderly Customer Never Missed a Lunch or Dinner for 10 Years – When He Didn’t Show Up, the Chef Hopped in His Car and Ended Up Saving His Life
‘Shop With a Cop’ Sends Less Fortunate Kids on Mini Christmas Shopping Sprees With New Police Pals
The iciest moments of 2025: The 5 political feuds that froze Washington

“It appears that Facebook helped the reporter who wrote this story identify the person behind the doctored video of Nancy Pelosi — i.e., Facebook used its own internal data to help publicly identify a private citizen” wrote Orr.

See also  The biggest political events of 2025

“That’s extremely troubling.”


Santa with CCW gets pulled over, tells Ohio deputy ‘you got to protect yourself’ during festive traffic stop
Nonprofit uses underwater technology to search for missing service members
Fox News ‘Antisemitism Exposed’ Newsletter: UN bigot out at Georgetown
Kim Jong Un swipes at South Korea’s progress building a nuclear submarine while inspecting his own
Poll: Young Protestants Are Officially Outnumbered by the ‘Nones’
Wild Christmas Miracle: Watch a Bona Fide Miracle in Real Time as Skydiver Gets Caught on Plane, Plummets, then Manages to Cheat Death
Biden nearly invisible in own Christmas family photo as Hunter takes center stage
5 Things the GOP Needs to Change to Win the 2026 Midterms
Lawmakers attempt to tackle NIL, giving it the ‘old college try’
LA Garbage Crisis Is So Bad One Man Quit His Job to Pick Up the City’s Slack
And We Thought Fruitcake Was Bad: Italian Company Is 3D Printing ‘Pastries’ That Are Made of Truly Gross-Sounding Ingredients
Migrant truckers sue California DMV over canceled commercial drivers’ licenses
An Elderly Customer Never Missed a Lunch or Dinner for 10 Years – When He Didn’t Show Up, the Chef Hopped in His Car and Ended Up Saving His Life
‘Shop With a Cop’ Sends Less Fortunate Kids on Mini Christmas Shopping Sprees With New Police Pals
The iciest moments of 2025: The 5 political feuds that froze Washington

“Facebook confirmed to the reporter that the video was first posted “directly from Brooks’ personal Facebook account.”

See also  Heritage Foundation staffers quit and join Mike Pence foundation

Santa with CCW gets pulled over, tells Ohio deputy ‘you got to protect yourself’ during festive traffic stop
Nonprofit uses underwater technology to search for missing service members
Fox News ‘Antisemitism Exposed’ Newsletter: UN bigot out at Georgetown
Kim Jong Un swipes at South Korea’s progress building a nuclear submarine while inspecting his own
Poll: Young Protestants Are Officially Outnumbered by the ‘Nones’
Wild Christmas Miracle: Watch a Bona Fide Miracle in Real Time as Skydiver Gets Caught on Plane, Plummets, then Manages to Cheat Death
Biden nearly invisible in own Christmas family photo as Hunter takes center stage
5 Things the GOP Needs to Change to Win the 2026 Midterms
Lawmakers attempt to tackle NIL, giving it the ‘old college try’
LA Garbage Crisis Is So Bad One Man Quit His Job to Pick Up the City’s Slack
And We Thought Fruitcake Was Bad: Italian Company Is 3D Printing ‘Pastries’ That Are Made of Truly Gross-Sounding Ingredients
Migrant truckers sue California DMV over canceled commercial drivers’ licenses
An Elderly Customer Never Missed a Lunch or Dinner for 10 Years – When He Didn’t Show Up, the Chef Hopped in His Car and Ended Up Saving His Life
‘Shop With a Cop’ Sends Less Fortunate Kids on Mini Christmas Shopping Sprees With New Police Pals
The iciest moments of 2025: The 5 political feuds that froze Washington

“So… Facebook is handing over information to reporters regarding what people are doing on their personal Facebook accounts?”

“The guy didn’t break any laws. He didn’t even violate any of Facebook’s policies, according to the company. The doctored video is still up! In Facebook’s eyes, this guy did nothing wrong — yet they just handed over his private data to a reporter. How is that justifiable?”

Breitbart News has reached out to Facebook for its side of the story.

Story cited here.

Share this article:
Share on Facebook
Facebook
Tweet about this on Twitter
Twitter