About half of Americans on both sides of the aisle back the Justice Department's antitrust lawsuit against Google, while fewer than a third oppose it, according to a new poll from progressive groups Demand Progress and Data for Progress shared exclusively with Axios. From a report: There's a growing pile of evidence that regulatory action against Big Tech has bipartisan support, as state and federal antitrust action circles companies like Google and Facebook. While there are many party-line splits on tech policy issues like content moderation, privacy and misinformation, more policymakers and average Americans than ever agree tech is too big and powerful. Winning antitrust suits represents a massive lift for the government and passing new antitrust legislation is hard. In an online survey of 979 likely voters polled by Demand Progress and the Demand Progress Education Fund from October 24-25 (with a margin of error of +-3.1 percentage points), 48% said they strongly or somewhat support the DOJ's lawsuit. 32% strongly or somewhat oppose it. The numbers were fairly consistent across both parties, with 52% of Republicans supporting the suit, compared to 49% of Democrats. 26% of Republicans polled opposed it, while 32% of Democrats did.

Judd Legum, reporting at Popular Information: In September, Facebook announced that it would stop accepting new political ads starting October 27. From October 27 through Election Day on November 3, political groups are permitted to run, subject to limitations, Facebook ads approved and running before October 27. In October, Facebook announced that after the polls close, it would ban all political ads indefinitely. The purpose of that policy is to prevent a campaign from declaring victory prematurely. Both policies were part of a high-profile effort to convince the public that the company was taking election integrity seriously. But on the first day of the moratorium, Facebook approved numerous Trump ads that appeared to violate its pre-election policies. At the same time, Facebook rejected scores of ads, many from groups aligned with Democrats, that do not violate its rules. Popular Information contacted Facebook regarding Trump's ads early Tuesday afternoon. Several hours later, Facebook told Popular Information that some of the ads did violate its policies and hundreds of Trump's ads were taken down.

The Trump campaign produced a number of ads that said "Election Day is Today." These ads violate Facebook's policies. Why? In order to comply with the moratorium, the ads need to begin delivering impressions prior to October 27. The Trump campaign spent a small amount of money delivering these ads to Facebook users in Ohio and elsewhere. But, while early voting has started in many states, it is not Election Day anywhere. These ads should not have been approved because they violate Faceboo's policy against misrepresenting the date of the election.

couchslug shares a report from The Register: Facebook has ordered the end to an academic monitoring project that has repeatedly exposed failures by the internet giant to clearly label political advertising on its platform. The social media goliath informed New York University (NYU) that research by its Tandon School of Engineering's Online Transparency Project's Ad Observatory violates Facebook's terms of service on bulk data collection and demanded it end the program immediately. The project recruited 6,500 volunteers to install its AdObserver browser extension that collects data on the ads that Facebook shows them personally. It sends the information to the American university, allowing it to perform a real-time check that Facebook is living up its promise to clearly disclose not only who paid for political ads shown on the platform but also how much and when the adverts would be shown.

The Facebook Ad Library is a public collection of all adverts running on Facebook, and any not suitably labeled are flagged up by the university project using data obtained via the AdObserver extension. Facebook didn't like this one bit, and responded with a warning letter on October 16, the Wall Street Journal first reported. The Silicon Valley titan wants the academic project shut down and all data deleted by November 30. It seems the researchers aren't backing down. On October 22, they published the latest research showing 12 political ads that had slipped under the radar as non-political on Facebook, some of which are still running.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Google knows that many people will be using YouTube to keep up with the US election on November 3rd. Many politicians use the platform to communicate with voters, and some news organizations will likely livestream round-the-clock coverage. Keeping up with Election Day can be difficult, though, so YouTube is preparing a small but useful information panel that will appear at the top of search results and election-centric videos. It will remind users that "results may not be final" and, using a massive 'SHOW ME' button, point them toward a Google-run election hub. It's not the first time that YouTube has used this feature. Back in March 2019, the Google-owned operation added an alert that appeared alongside controversial search queries. If someone had typed 'virus in paracetamol,' for instance, YouTube would throw up a small card that details the hoax and, more importantly, a trustworthy assessment from a fact-checking partner such as The Quint. It was launched in India but has since expanded to other countries including the US. Last month, YouTube also introduced some panels that appear alongside election-related queries -- such as how to vote, and how to register to vote in your state -- and link to information by authoritative sources such as the Bipartisan Policy Center think tank.

A Georgia county has reverted to matching some absentee ballot signatures to paper backups, rather than an online system, after a ransomware infection spread to part of its election department. From a report: Poll workers in Hall County have since caught up on a backlog of absentee ballots, state officials said, and said there's no danger of the ransomware extending to systems used to cast or count votes. But the infection is the first known example in the 2020 general election of opportunistic criminal hackers incidentally slowing the broader election process, something that federal cybersecurity officials have warned is a strong possibility. But the attack does not indicate any broad effort to tamper with U.S. voting or show systemic vulnerabilities to the U.S. election system. "They switched over to their paper backups, which is required of them," said Jordan Fuchs, Georgia's deputy secretary of state. "It took a little bit of work on their part -- I think they had 11 days of catch-up to do -- and they completed their task," she said.

America's national health agency "halted a public-service coronavirus advertising campaign funded by $250 million in taxpayer money after it offered a special vaccine deal to an unusual set of essential workers: Santa Claus performers."

The Wall Street Journal reports: As part of the plan, a top Trump administration official wanted the Santa performers to promote the benefits of a Covid-19 vaccination and, in exchange, offered them early vaccine access ahead of the general public, according to audio recordings. Those who perform as Mrs. Claus and elves also would have been included....

The decision comes as the Covid-19 spread continues to accelerate in most states, and the vaccines are unlikely to be broadly available to the public before the holiday season. The coronavirus ad effort — titled "Covid 19 Public Health and Reopening America Public Service Announcements and Advertising Campaign" — was intended to "defeat despair, inspire hope and achieve national recovery," according to a work statement reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. It was to include television, radio, online and podcast announcements, starting immediately. The public-relations blitz began to fizzle after some celebrities, including actor Dennis Quaid, shied away from participating, a former White House official said, amid concerns that the campaign would be viewed as political rather than aiding public health....

[Former pharmaceutical lobbyist Alex Azar, now serving as America's Secretary of Health], has "ordered a strategic review of this public health education campaign that will be led by top public health and communications experts to determine whether the campaign serves important public health purposes," Health and Human Services officials said in a statement.
Santa's vaccines were the brainchild of Michael Caputo, a political strategist/lobbyist also appointed to America's Health and Human Services as assistant secretary, according to the Journal. But an HHS spokesman now tells them that the Santa "collaboration will not be happening."

They also get a quote from Ric Erwin, chairman of the Fraternal Order of Real Bearded Santas — who called the news "extremely disappointing." In a 12-minute phone call in late August, Mr. Caputo told Mr. Erwin of the Santa group that vaccines would likely be approved by mid-November and distributed to front-line workers before Thanksgiving.

"If you and your colleagues are not essential workers, I don't know what is," Mr. Caputo said on the call, which was recorded by Mr. Erwin and provided to the Journal. [In audio of the call published by the Journal, Santa responds by saying "Ho ho ho ho, ho ho ho. I love you."]

"I cannot wait to tell the president," Mr. Caputo said at another point about the plan. "He's going to love this." Mr. Erwin said on the call: "Since you would be doing Santa a serious favor, Santa would definitely reciprocate."

Mr. Caputo said: "I'm in, Santa, if you're in...."

Mr. Caputo said he wanted Santas to appear at rollout events in as many as 35 cities. In exchange, he said the Santas would get an early crack at inoculation.

The Louisiana National Guard was called in to stop a series of cyberattacks aimed at small government offices across the state in recent weeks, Reuters reported Friday, citing two people with knowledge of the events, highlighting the cyber threat facing local governments in the run up to the 2020 U.S. presidential election. From the report: The situation in Louisiana follows a similar case in Washington state, according to a cybersecurity consultant familiar with the matter, where hackers infected some government offices with a type of malware known for deploying ransomware, which locks up systems and demands payment to regain access. Senior U.S. security officials have warned here since at least 2019 that ransomware poses a risk to the U.S. election, namely that an attack against certain state government offices around the election could disrupt systems needed to administer aspects of the vote. It is unclear if the hackers sought to target systems tied to the election in Louisiana or were simply hoping for a payday. Yet the attacks raised alarms because of the potential harm it could have led to and due to evidence suggesting a sophisticated hacking group was involved. Experts investigating the Louisiana incidents found a tool used by the hackers that was previously linked to a group associated with the North Korean government, according to a person familiar with the investigation.

Expensify CEO David Barrett blasted all of his customers with a message to vote for Biden to "protect democracy." From a report: In the email, which the company has said was sent to all users, Expensify's founder said that "anything less than a vote for Biden is a vote against democracy" and urged his customer base to vote for the Democratic presidential candidate. In the email, he equated a vote for Trump as an endorsement for voter suppression, and took issue with people who may want to abstain or vote for a third-party candidate: "I'm saying a vote for Trump, a vote for a third-party candidate, or simply not voting at all -- they're all the same, and they all mean: 'I care more about my favorite issue than democracy. I believe Trump winning is more important than democracy. I am comfortable standing aside and allowing democracy to be methodically dismantled, in plain sight,'" he wrote in the email.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe and FBI Director Christopher Wray joined forces at a hastily announced press conference Wednesday night to issue a warning that foreign actors "have taken specific actions to influence public opinion relating to our elections." Specifically, Ratcliffe said, actors from Iran and Russia had separately obtained "some voter registration information" and were using it "to communicate false information to registered voters that they hope will cause confusion, sow chaos, and undermine your confidence in American democracy."

Ratcliffe was referring to an email campaign that started earlier this week, when some voters in Florida, Arizona, and Alaska started receiving threatening messages. "Vote for Trump... or we will come after you," the emails read. "Change your party affiliation to Republican to let us know you received our message and will comply. We will know which candidate you voted for. I would take this seriously if I were you. Good luck."

The emails purported to come from the Proud Boys, a known US-based right-wing extremist group that has become increasingly active since its founding in 2016 and which President Donald Trump has tacitly supported. The Proud Boys reportedly denied involvement, however, and Vice Motherboard reported on Tuesday that the messages originated from a server in Estonia and were likely using a spoofed email address. [...] Ratcliffe on Wednesday said that Iran was behind the spoofed emails and videos, which he claimed were "designed to intimidate voters, incite social unrest, and damage President Trump." Iran denied any involvement. "Unlike the US, Iran does not interfere in other country's elections," Alireza Miryousefi, a spokesman for the Iranian Mission to the United Nations, told NBC News late Wednesday. "The world has been witnessing US' own desperate public attempts to question the outcome of its own elections at the highest level. These accusations are nothing more than another scenario to undermine voter confidence in the security of the US election and are absurd." "You should be confident that your vote counts," Wray added. "Early, unverified claims to the contrary should be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism. We encourage everyone to seek election and voting information from reliable sources -- namely, your state election officials. And to be thoughtful, careful, and discerning consumers of information online."

Less than two weeks before the U.S. election, some political campaigns are dealing with an unexpected obstacle on YouTube, the internet's largest video site: There isn't enough space to run their ads. From a report: Campaigns have flooded YouTube with commercials in search of voters they may not be reaching on television. Yet despite its nearly endless supply of video clips, YouTube has been struggling to place these ads in front of the desired audience. The site has a particular shortage of ad slots in critical swing states, causing prices to double in some instances. This makes political ads more lucrative for Google, which owns YouTube. The company saw advertising revenue dip earlier this year and is set to announce its quarterly earnings next week. The situation has sent smaller campaigns scrambling to find advertising opportunities elsewhere. "There's a crunch," said Cat Stern, media director for Lockwood Strategy Lab, a digital campaign agency focused on Democratic candidates and progressive advocacy organizations. "All political advertisers are buying in the same states, to similar audiences." She equated the commercial spree to the online spending binge during Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Viewership has shot up on YouTube during the pandemic. While commercial advertising remains anemic, there has been a glut of political ads. Many political ad buyers are interested in YouTube's limited amount of commercials that viewers can't skip through. They're also vying for ads that YouTube sells based on reservations, which can be purchased in advance, like television slots, and run against YouTube's most popular videos. "The reserves tend to be gobbled up by well-funded campaigns," said Reid Vineis, vice president of digital at Majority Strategies, a Republican political ad firm. He has seen prices for some of these ads double in recent weeks. That has forced some campaigns, particularly small ones, to look at alternative digital video outlets such as Hulu and Roku.

Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to authorize subpoenas for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to testify about their handling of a recent unverified New York Post article about former Vice President Joe Biden's son. From a report: Twelve Republicans on the committee voted to authorize the subpoenas and ten Democrats sat out the markup in a protest of the session's earlier vote on the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. Zuckerberg and Dorsey are already set to testify before the Senate Commerce Committee next week alongside Google CEO Sundar Pichai about alleged bias and privacy matters. The Judiciary Committee voted to compel the Facebook and Twitter CEOs to testify about their "suppression and/or censorship" of two recent New York Post articles involving unverified allegations about emails supposedly taken from a computer belonging to the Democratic presidential nominee's son, Hunter Biden. The initial story alleged the younger Biden attempted to introduce a top executive at a Ukraine company he worked for to his father while he was serving as VP. The Democratic nominee has called the story a "smear." Facebook and Twitter took very different approaches to moderating the article, which contained unredacted email addresses in documents included in the story.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) made her Twitch debut last night to play Among Us and quickly became one of the platform's biggest broadcasters. According to Twitch, her stream peaked at 435,000 viewers around the time of her first match. The Verge reports: That peak viewership puts her broadcast among the 20 biggest streams ever, according to the third-party metrics site TwitchTracker, and much higher if you're only looking at broadcasts from individual streamers. Ninja holds the record for an individual streamer, with more than 600,000 viewers during a Fortnite match with Drake in 2018. TwitchTracker's metrics suggest that AOC's stream could in the top 10 for an individual in terms of peak viewers.

Ocasio-Cortez's stream came together quickly. She tweeted Monday asking, "Anyone want to play Among Us with me on Twitch to get out the vote?" Major streamers quickly signed up -- she ended up being joined by Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Pokimane, HasanAbi, Disguised Toast, DrLupo, and more. Her stream even had graphics prepared, which Ocasio-Cortez said came from supporters who started making art after she tweeted. Despite only having minimal Among Us experience -- Ocasio-Cortez said Monday that she'd never played before, but seemed to have brushed up before the stream -- she did well in her first broadcast. She was chosen as an impostor in the first round and, with a partner, knocked out about half the field before getting caught. Omar later made it to the final three as an impostor before getting voted out by Ocasio-Cortez and Hasan.

dcblogs writes: A significant number of employees are avoiding co-workers because of political views, says one research group. "Not only are employees avoiding one another, but they're also having a tougher time staying focused," said Brent Cassell, a Gartner analyst. The firm, which has surveyed workers, say the office tensions over politics are at their highest level. Firms are also on guard against the possibility of workplace disruptions and arguments. In Florida, a battleground state, there's a lot of concern about rising office tensions. "I think we're going to see an interesting atmosphere over the next couple of weeks," said Heather Deyrieux, president of the HR Florida State Council.

"Facing the prospect that President Trump could lose his re-election bid, his cabinet is scrambling to enact regulatory changes affecting millions of Americans in a blitz so rushed it may leave some changes vulnerable to court challenges," reports the New York Times: The effort is evident in a broad range of federal agencies and encompasses proposals like easing limits on how many hours some truckers can spend behind the wheel, giving the government more freedom to collect biometric data and setting federal standards for when workers can be classified as independent contractors rather than employees. In the bid to lock in new rules before Jan. 20, Mr. Trump's team is limiting or sidestepping requirements for public comment on some of the changes and swatting aside critics who say the administration has failed to carry out sufficiently rigorous analysis. Some cases, like a new rule to allow railroads to move highly flammable liquefied natural gas on freight trains, have led to warnings of public safety threats...

If Democrats take control of Congress, they will have the power to reconsider some of these last-minute regulations, through a law last used at the start of Mr. Trump's tenure by Republicans to repeal certain rules enacted at the end of the Obama administration. But the Trump administration is also working to fill key vacancies on scientific advisory boards with members who will hold their seats far into the next presidential term, committees that play an important role in shaping federal rule making...

The Homeland Security Department is also moving, again with an unusually short 30-day comment period, to adopt a rule that will allow it to collect much more extensive biometric data from individuals applying for citizenship, including voice, iris and facial recognition scans, instead of just the traditional fingerprint scan. The measure, which the agency said was needed to curb fraud, would also allow it for the first time to collect DNA or DNA test results to verify a relationship between an application for citizenship and someone already in the United States.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: On Thursday, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai said that the agency will seek to regulate social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter at the behest of the Trump administration's executive order signed earlier this year. "Members of all three branches of the federal government have expressed serious concerns about the prevailing interpretation of the immunity set for in Section 230 of the Communications Act. There is bipartisan support in Congress to reform the law," Pai said in a statement Thursday. "Social media companies have a First Amendment right to free speech. But they do not have a First Amendment right to a special immunity denied to other media outlets, such as newspapers and broadcasters."

On Thursday, Pai said that the commission's general counsel said that "the FCC has the legal authority to reinterpret Section 230." He continued, "Consistent with this advice, I intend to move forward with a rulemaking to clarify its meaning." "Pai's decision to move forward with rulemaking follows a series of moderation decisions on Wednesday made by Facebook and Twitter against a New York Post article regarding former Vice President Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, who has been the subject of political attacks from the right throughout the 2020 presidential election," the report adds.

Facebook reduced the reach of the story, while Twitter banned linking to the story entirely. "These moves from Facebook and Twitter incited an outcry over conservative bias from Republicans," reports The Verge.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Drive: Whether or not you live in Massachusetts, you should be paying attention to a very important vote coming up in November's election. Not for president, or senator, or even city council -- no, Question 1 is a proposition that could dramatically strengthen or weaken the state's landmark right-to-repair law that previously forced automakers to make it easier for you to get your car fixed. Essentially, Massachusetts voters are deciding on whether or not to add "mechanical" vehicle telematics data -- realtime updates from a car's sundry sensors transmitted to an automaker's private servers -- to the list of things OEMs have to share with independent mechanics. Telematics data was purposefully excluded from the original 2013 law, but as cars have gotten more computerized over the last decade, that gap in coverage has grown more pronounced.

The full information about what is appearing on the ballot can be found here. Voting "Yes" to Question 1 would expand access to wirelessly transmitted mechanical data regarding vehicle maintenance and repair. But what makes this a big deal for those outside Massachusetts is that the amendment will require automakers who want to do business in the state to make that data accessible through a smartphone app for owners starting in 2022. Remember, it was the 2013 law's passage that forced automakers to adopt a nationwide right-to-repair standard. Could the same happen with open-access telematics data, which will only grow in importance as more cars add on driver-assist features? Pro-Question 1 organization Massachusetts Right to Repair argues the amendment would futureproof the law for consumers and independent repair shops beyond the state's borders. "Voting 'No' would make no change to governing access over wirelessly transmitted vehicle data, meaning automakers would be under no obligation to provide a standard that consumers could use to analyze diagnostic information other than what is currently provided through the vehicle's OBDII port," adds The Drive.

"[T]he Coalition for Safe and Secure Data has shelled out at least $25.8 million to oppose Question 1, reportedly receiving large seven-figure donations from General Motors, Toyota, Ford, Honda and Nissan. Go figure."

Virginia's voter-registration website went offline Tuesday on the state's last day to register before the Nov. 3 election, in what officials attributed to an accidental cutting of a fiber-optic cable. From a report: The Virginia Information Technologies Agency said that the Verizon cable was inadvertently struck during work for a roadside utilities project and that several agencies were affected. The Virginia Department of Elections didn't immediately respond to a request asking if the deadline to register, originally set for the end of Tuesday, would be extended once service was restored. Voters can also register using a paper application. In recent weeks, voter-registration websites in Florida and Pennsylvania, both considered potentially decisive swing states for the presidential election, crashed due, officials said, to glitches. Florida extended the deadline to register to vote after its registration website malfunctioned. The state's secretary of state cited unprecedented traffic to the site as the cause.

California's elections include grass roots propositions that change the law directly while bypassing legislators. Uber, Lyft, and Uber-owned Postmates (as well as DoorDash and Instacart) have spent $185 million — the most ever spent — pushing a proposition that would keep ride-hail and delivery drivers as independent contractors, reports SFGate. "If it passes...gig corporations won't have to contribute to Social Security, Medicare or unemployment insurance. They won't have to offer paid sick leave, workers compensation or unemployment benefits to drivers."

But the site also investigated what happened shortly after the Uber/Lyft PAC reported an $128,000 expenditure on mailers: Political mailers masquerading as progressive voter guides and endorsing Proposition 22, the initiative backed by Uber and Lyft, are showing up in Southern California voters' mailboxes. The fine print on one mailer says it was prepared by the "Feel the Bern, Progressive Voter Guide," which is not an actual organization. Neither are the "Council of Concerned Women Voters Guide" nor the "Our Voice, Latino Voter Guide," whose mailers make the same endorsements as Feel the Bern.

Mailed political fliers typically identify the organization that paid for the literature. But that information was conspicuously absent from Feel the Bern and the other two mailers...

The measure would allow ride-hail and delivery drivers to continue to be treated as independent contractors, although with some new benefit concessions. If it fails, these employees would likely be considered workers entitled to a minimum wage, overtime pay, workers' compensation, unemployment insurance and paid sick leave.

The California Democratic Party has endorsed a "no" vote for Prop. 22.

BishopBerkeley writes: In another first, the editors of the The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) endorse Joe Biden by stating that the current government needs to be fired. Although they don't mention any names, the editors of the NEJM state in shockingly forceful and accusatory language that the current administration is totally incompetent and does not deserve to keep its job. The editorial, somberly titled "Dying in a Leadership Vacuum" bases its opinion on some dispiriting statistics:

"The magnitude of this failure is astonishing. According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering, the United States leads the world in Covid-19 cases and in deaths due to the disease, far exceeding the numbers in much larger countries, such as China. The death rate in this country is more than double that of Canada, exceeds that of Japan, a country with a vulnerable and elderly population, by a factor of almost 50, and even dwarfs the rates in lower-middle-income countries, such as Vietnam, by a factor of almost 2000. Covid-19 is an overwhelming challenge, and many factors contribute to its severity. But the one we can control is how we behave. And in the United States we have consistently behaved poorly."

The Administration's extreme rhetoric and extreme actions are earning extreme reactions. Last month, Scientific American broke a 175-year tradition of not endorsing a presidential candidate by throwing their support behind Joe Biden. "We'd love to stay out of politics, but this president has been so anti-science that we can't ignore it," editor in chief, Laura Helmuth told The Washington Post.

The editor in chief of Science Magazine also denounced Trump, but stopped short of endorsing presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Sixty Coinbase employees have accepted a buyout offer after CEO Brian Armstrong announced a controversial new policy curbing political activism inside the company. Armstrong disclosed the figure in a Thursday email to employees. Ars Technica reports: Armstrong announced the new policy last week after a summer when many technology companies faced pressure from their employees to become more outspoken on issues of social justice. "While I think these efforts are well-intentioned, they have the potential to destroy a lot of value at most companies, both by being a distraction, and by creating internal division," Armstrong wrote in a September 27 blog post. "We've seen what internal strife at companies like Google and Facebook can do to productivity. I believe most employees don't want to work in these divisive environments."

Now Armstrong says that 60 employees accepted the package. Armstrong says that's about 5 percent of the company's headcount. A few more employees are still in discussions with the company and may accept it in the coming days. "For those of you who have decided to move on, I want to thank you for your contributions to Coinbase and we wish you the very best," Armstrong wrote. "And for those of you who are opting in to the next chapter, I want to thank you for your trust and commitment to this mission." Armstrong said that "people from under-represented groups" at Coinbase did not accept the buyout offer in disproportionate numbers. Armstrong said he was committed to "building a diverse, inclusive environment where everyone feels they belong." And while Coinbase is discouraging most forms of political advocacy, Armstrong acknowledged one exception: that cryptocurrency itself is "inherently political." Armstrong wrote that he is "OK being political about this one particular area because it relates to our mission."