[10] In an interview with The Christian Post, Ford cited several reasons for the sale, including his discomfort with the power wielded by social media companies like Facebook over creators and what he perceived as an anti-conservative and anti-Christian bias.

Citing the "inevitable consequences of burnout" that came from keeping up with current events, he handed over full control to brothers Seth and Dan Dillon.

[2] By January 2021, The Washington Times said that The Babylon Bee was receiving more than 20 million page views per month, had more than 20,000 paid subscribers, and had a Twitter account with more than 856,000 followers.

[17] The Babylon Bee began by lampooning a wide range of topics including progressives, Democrats, Republicans, Christians, and Donald Trump.

"[20] In an April 2016 Washington Post profile of the site and its founder, Bob Smietana observed that "The Bee excels at poking fun at the small idiosyncrasies of believers, especially evangelical Protestants.

"[3] Susan E. Isaacs publishing in Christianity Today wrote in May 2018 that the site "lampoon[ed] the faithful across denominations, political affiliations, and age groups".

[25] Jennifer Graham of Deseret News attributed the success of The Babylon Bee in 2021 to "the increasing polarization in America, with Republicans and Democrats clustering in information silos that reflect and affirm their beliefs.

"[26] As the readership of The Babylon Bee increased from 2016 to 2020, there were independent, ongoing discussions within journalistic circles on how to handle the rise of fake news and its influence on the public.

[32] Reason's John Osterhoudt said that the headlines had been "stripped of both context and comedy", giving as an example The Babylon Bee headline "CNN: 'God Allowed the Mueller Report to Test Our Shakeable Faith in Collusion'" that was rephrased to participants as "CNN news anchor Anderson Cooper said his belief that Trump colluded with Russia is unshakable; it will not change regardless of statements or evidence to the contrary.

[34][22] In September 2020, British newspaper The Guardian reprinted as factual a Bee-doctored image of LeBron James wearing a lace collar supposedly in tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

[36][30] This event prompted Kevin Roose, writing in The New York Times, to question whether The Babylon Bee "traffic[s] in misinformation under the guise of comedy", concluding that "The Babylon Bee is not a covert disinformation operation disguised as a right-wing satire site, and is in fact trying to do comedy, but may inadvertently be spreading bad information when people take their stories too seriously".

A jesting report in the Bee will be fact-checked and censored, usually briefly, by social media platforms" and that "as a consequence, the satirical website has been fondly christened by its conservative blogging brethren as 'the paper of record.

[34] The Babylon Bee's Twitter account was briefly suspended in August 2020 after being mistakenly caught in one of the social media company's spam filters.

[41] In October 2020, The Babylon Bee put up a Facebook post linking to a story about the Amy Coney Barrett Supreme Court nomination, with the headline "Senator Hirono Demands ACB Be Weighed Against a Duck to See If She Is a Witch" (a reference to the 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail).

Citing its policies against incitement to violence, Facebook removed the post and demonetized The Babylon Bee's page on the social media platform.

Facebook then cited this fact check in a warning message to The Babylon Bee, threatening to limit its content distribution and monetization.

"[34] In July 2019, The Babylon Bee published an article referring to a real-world incident, titled "Georgia Lawmaker Claims Chick-Fil-A Employee Told Her to Go Back to Her Country, Later Clarifies He Actually Said 'My Pleasure'", which Snopes rated "false".

[46] The statement concluded by saying a law firm had been retained to represent The Babylon Bee because "Snopes appears to be actively engaged in an effort to discredit and deplatform us."

He said The Babylon Bee must take the matter seriously "because social networks, which we depend on for our traffic, have relied upon fact-checking sources in the past to determine what's fake news and what isn't.

"[18] Snopes' co-founder David Mikkelson acknowledged to The New York Times that their fact-check was poorly written, but denied trying to discredit The Babylon Bee.

But when the culture bows down and starts handing out trophies to people for stuff like this is when we say, 'Hey, wait a minute, you know, we need to protect women in our society as well.

Dillon added, "I wouldn't suggest that The Babylon Bee is the sole reason Musk decided to take action", but "I do think the absurdity of his favorite satire site getting suspended factored into his decision.

[59] He officially acquired Twitter on October 27, and within hours directed the Trust and Safety team to urgently reinstate The Babylon Bee's account.

Musk saw The Babylon Bee's suspension as emblematic of what he viewed as partisan, predominantly liberal, moderation overreach that had prompted him to acquire Twitter.

[55] In a conference with lawyer Alex Spiro and then-Trust and Safety head Yoel Roth,[60] Musk described The Babylon Bee's tweet about Levine as "not cool", but said it did not rise to the level of violent threats that should trigger moderation action.

[61][55] On March 28, 2023, Dillon testified as an expert witness before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce's Subcommittee on Communications and Technology as part of a discussion on regulation.

[64] Seth Dillon stated the "dox and smear campaign against us wasn’t actually journalism, but an attempt to censor speech they don’t like",[65] and Elon Musk called the SPLC a 'criminal organization'.

The bill requires social media companies to submit reports to the California Attorney General concerning their enforcement of policies against hate speech, disinformation, harassment, and extremism.

Filed by the Alliance Defending Freedom, the complaint alleges that the laws are overly broad and "grant California unbridled enforcement discretion.

[71] Shortly after filing, a federal judge granted an injunction against California's enforcement of these rules stating that they "unconstitutionally stifle the free and unfettered exchange of ideas.