YouTube recently demonetized a video it had previously approved consisting entirely of quotes of Republicans and Democrats alleging election vulnerabilities and crimes, the video’s creator confirmed to The Federalist Tuesday. Matt Orfalea showed The Federalist a June 7 email from YouTube saying his video was “suitable for all advertisers” after “manually reviewing.”
A YouTube spokesman Tuesday, however, told The Federalist the video was just a few months later banned from providing its creator ad revenue because it contained “demonstrably false claims that could significantly undermine participation or trust in an electoral process.” The spokesman did not answer The Federalist’s question of exactly what information in the video was “demonstrably false.”
With no other notification from YouTube, on Aug. 21, Orfalea found a notice inside his channel saying a YouTube reviewer had decided the video depicted or encouraged “harmful or dangerous acts” and presented “situations that may endanger participants.” The video consists entirely of quotes from Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, a few TV reporters, and some other Republicans and Democrats publicly contesting election results from 2016 to 2020.
YouTube demonetized and then deleted this same video before, in November 2022. At that time, YouTube also demonetized and deleted similar videos on Orfalea’s channel, including videos that weren’t public, says Racket journalist Matt Taibbi, who commissioned the videos. For these transgressions, YouTube gave Orfalea’s channel a strike, three of which result in a permanent ban from the platform.
Those banned videos also simply clipped accurate news quotes of both Republicans and Democrats
