Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a letter to the House Judiciary Committee on Monday that he regrets not having been more vocal about “government pressure” to remove content related to COVID-19.

Zuckerberg said senior Biden administration officials “repeatedly pressured” Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to “censor” content in 2021.

“I believe the administration’s pressure was misguided, and I regret that we were not more vocal,” he wrote to House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

“As I told our teams at the time, I believe strongly that we should not compromise our content standards because of pressure from any administration in any direction — and we are prepared to fight back if that happens again,” Zuckerberg added.

Meta’s CEO also said the company “should not have downgraded” a New York Post article about corruption allegations involving President Biden’s family ahead of the 2020 election while it waited for fact-checkers to review it.

The social media company has since adjusted its policies and processes, including no longer downgrading content in the U.S. pending fact-checking, he noted.

Zuckerberg also wrote in Monday’s letter that he does not plan to contribute to local governments to support election infrastructure this election, as he did during the 2020 election.

The contributions, which were “designed to be nonpartisan,” were accused of being unfairly divided between left- and right-leaning areas and were dubbed “Zuckerbucks” by Republicans.

“Yet, despite the analysis I’ve seen to the contrary, I know that some people believe this work has benefited one party more than the other,” Zuckerberg said. “My goal is to be neutral and not to play a role in any way — or even appear to play a role.”

House Republicans hailed the letter Monday night as a “major victory for free speech.”

“Mark Zuckerberg just admitted three things: 1. The Biden-Harris administration ‘pressured’ Facebook to censor Americans. 2. Facebook censored Americans. 3. Facebook suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story,” the panel wrote on the social media platform X.

“Mark Zuckerberg also tells the Judiciary Committee he will not spend any money this election cycle. That’s right, no more Zuck-bucks. Huge win for election integrity,” it added.

Meta and other social media companies have long been accused by Republicans of censoring conservative content on their platforms.

The Biden administration’s communications with social media companies about COVID-19 removal and election misinformation were at the center of a case before the Supreme Court last term.

In a 6-3 decision in June, the court rejected objections to the officials’ communications with the companies, ruling that the two Republican attorneys general and private parties who brought the case had no standing. The justices did not, however, rule on the First Amendment issues in the case.

“When we were faced with a deadly pandemic, this administration encouraged responsible actions to protect public health and safety,” a White House spokesman said in a statement.

“Our position is clear and consistent: we believe that technology companies and other private actors must consider the effects their actions have on the American people while making independent choices about the information they present,” they added.

Updated Aug 27 at 9:37am ET

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