Patrick Gaspard, president of George Soros' Open Society Foundations, a non-governmental organization, called for US lawmakers to establish federal oversight of Facebook. The social media platform earlier admitted to hiring a research firm to "demonize" the billionaire.
Gaspard also slammed Facebook's move to hire Definers, a public affairs company, in retaliation following Soros' public criticism of the social network.
"So Facebook decides to drop a turkey on Thanksgiving Eve, with admission that Definers was tasked by company leadership to target and smear George Soros because he publicly criticized their out-of-control business model. Sorry, but this needs independent, congressional oversight," Gaspard was quoted by The Wall Street Journal as saying.
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Earlier this week, Facebook's departing policy and communications chief Elliot Schrage admitted that she "knew and approved of the decision to hire Definers and similar firms" to discredit Soros.
"We had not heard such criticism from him before and wanted to determine if he had any financial motivation. Definers researched this using public information," Schrage said referring to Soros' speech at the 2018 World Economic Forum in Davos.
In November 2017, Soros reportedly sold off 300,000 shares in Facebook, but then bought them back in the summer of 2018.
In the latest development, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings indicated that Soros managed to sell off his stake in Facebook before the social media giant’s stock plummeted drastically earlier this year.
