Sacha Baron Cohen Calls out Donald Trump for ‘Dangerous Moment’ Amid Baseless Voting Fraud Claims

Sacha Baron Cohen has dubbed the current political climate “a dangerous moment” in our nation’s history as President Donald Trump continues to contest the 2020 presidential election results. In a post shared to Twitter exactly a week after Election Day, the Borat star called out both Trump and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg over election misinformation.

In the tweet, shared alongside a side-by-side image of Trump and Zuckerberg, Cohen wrote that “this is a dangerous moment. Trump won’t concede. Facebook is spreading his lies about voting fraud.” The comedian, addressing Zuckerberg by name, added, “Mark–history will judge you by what you do next. You have a choice–stand with Trump or stand with democracy. The whole world is watching,” echoing the words of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who, earlier in the day, refused to acknowledge President-elect Joe Biden as the winner of the election “there will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration,” adding that “the world is watching,” according to The Wrap.

In the days leading up to, and in the days since, the election, Cohen has been outspoken on social media. In an Oct. 8 op-ed for Time, he had addressed misinformation surrounding the election, criticizing Facebook in particular. Warning that the “survival of democracy itself” is at stake due to the threat of conspiracies, he claimed that Zuckerberg was Trump’s “willing accomplice” in spreading false information by giving him “a megaphone that history’s worst autocrats could only dream of.”

In the post, Cohen wrote that the platform’s algorithm amplifies content that generates more engagement, citing a Facebook executive who said, “‘Right-wing populism is always more engaging’ because it triggers ‘anger, fear’ and ‘an incredibly strong, primitive emotion.’” He also criticized the platform for refusing “to fact-check political ads and posts—which it then microtargets to voters.”

“The fate of U.S. democracy now rests with voters and whether they stand up in record numbers and choose truth over lies,” he wrote in an address to American voters. “As protesters outside the 1968 Democratic convention chanted after they were brutally beaten by police, ‘The whole world is watching’—and this time it’s to see whether our planet’s oldest democracy will endure or slide into autocracy.”