From ACT For America <[email protected]>
Subject Could Twitter Doc Dump Be a Game Changer?
Date December 6, 2022 8:30 AM
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Censorship by Surrogate

[ACT For America]
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Censorship by surrogate: Why Musk’s document dump could be a game
changer

THE HILL | JONATHAN TURLEY | 12/03/22

“HANDLED.” THAT ONE WORD, RESPONDING TO A 2020 DEMAND TO CENSOR A
LIST OF TWITTER USERS, SPEAKS VOLUMES ABOUT THE THOUSANDS OF DOCUMENTS
RELEASED BY TWITTER’S NEW OWNER, ELON MUSK
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ON FRIDAY NIGHT. As many of us have long suspected, there were back
channels between Twitter and the Biden 2020 presidential campaign and
the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to ban critics or remove
negative stories. Those seeking to discuss the scandal were simply
“handled,” and nothing else had to be said.

Ultimately, the New York Post was suspended from Twitter for reporting
on the Hunter Biden
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laptop scandal. Twitter even blocked users from sharing
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the Post’s story by using a tool designed for child pornography.
Even Trump White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany
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was suspended for linking to the scandal
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Twitter’s ex-safety chief, Yoel Roth, later said
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the decision was a “mistake” but the story “set off every single
one of my finely tuned APT28 hack and leak campaign alarm bells.”
The reference to the APT28 Russian disinformation operation dovetailed
with false claims of former U.S. intelligence officers
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that the laptop was “classic disinformation.”

The Russian disinformation claim was never particularly credible. The
Biden campaign never denied the laptop was Hunter Biden’s; it left
that to its media allies. Moreover, recipients of key emails could
confirm those communications, and U.S. intelligence quickly rejected
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the Russian disinformation claim.

The point is, there was no direct evidence of a hack or a Russian
conspiracy. Even Roth subsequently admitted he and others did not
believe a clear basis existed to block the story, but they did so
anyway.

MUSK’S DUMPED TWITTER DOCUMENTS NOT ONLY CONFIRM THE WORST
EXPECTATIONS OF SOME OF US but feature many of the usual suspects for
Twitter critics. The documents do not show a clear role or knowledge
by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Instead, the censor in chief
appears to be Vijaya Gadde
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Twitter’s former chief legal officer who has been criticized
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as a leading anti-free speech figure in social media.

THERE ALSO IS JAMES BAKER
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THE CONTROVERSIAL FORMER FBI GENERAL COUNSEL INVOLVED IN THE
BUREAU’S RUSSIA COLLUSION INVESTIGATION. HE LEFT THE FBI AND BECAME
TWITTER’S DEPUTY GENERAL COUNSEL.

[Stop Big Tech Sensorship]
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[Click Here. ACTNOW]
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Some Twitter executives expressed unease with censoring the story,
including former global communications VP Brandon Borrman, who asked
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“Can we truthfully claim that this is part of the policy?” Baker
jumped in to support censorship and said
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“It’s reasonable for us to assume that they may have been [hacked]
and that caution is warranted.” Baker thus comes across as someone
who sees a Russian in every Rorschach inkblot. There was no evidence
the Post’s Hunter Biden material was hacked — none. Yet Baker
found a basis for a “reasonable” assumption that Russians or
hackers were behind it.

Many people recognized the decision for what it was. A former Twitter
employee reportedly told
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journalist Matt Taibbi, “HACKING WAS THE EXCUSE, BUT WITHIN A FEW
HOURS, PRETTY MUCH EVERYONE REALIZED THAT WASN’T GOING TO HOLD.”

Obviously, bias in the media is nothing new to Washington; newspapers
and networks have long run interference for favored politicians or
parties. However, this was not a case of a media company spiking its
own story to protect a pal. It was a social media company that
supplies a platform for people to communicate with each other on
political, social and personal views. Social media is now more popular
as a form of communications than the telephone.

CENSORING COMMUNICATIONS ON TWITTER IS MORE AKIN TO THE TELEPHONE
COMPANY AGREEING TO CUT THE CONNECTION OF ANY CALLER USING DISFAVORED
TERMS. AND AT THE APPARENT REQUEST OF THE 2020 BIDEN CAMPAIGN AND THE
DNC, TWITTER SEEMS TO HAVE ROUTINELY STOPPED OTHERS FROM DISCUSSING OR
HEARING OPPOSING VIEWS.

The internal company documents released by Musk reinforce what we have
seen previously in other instances of Twitter censorship. A recent
federal filing
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revealed a 2021 email between Twitter executives and Carol Crawford,
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s digital media
chief. Crawford’s back-channel communication sought to censor other
“unapproved opinions” on social media; Twitter replied that
“with our CEO testifying before Congress this week [it] is
tricky.”

At the time, Twitter’s Dorsey and other tech CEOs were about to
appear at a House hearing to discuss “misinformation” on social
media and their “content modification” policies. I had just
testified on private censorship
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in circumventing the First Amendment as a type of censorship by
surrogate. Dorsey and the other CEOs were asked about my warning of a
“‘little brother’ problem, a problem which private entities do
for the government that which it cannot legally do for itself.” In
response, Dorsey insisted that “we don’t have a censoring
department
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THE IMPLICATIONS OF THESE DOCUMENTS BECOMES MORE SERIOUS ONCE THE
BIDEN CAMPAIGN BECAME THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION. THESE DOCUMENTS SHOW A
BACK CHANNEL EXISTED WITH PRESIDENT BIDEN’S
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CAMPAIGN OFFICIALS, BUT THOSE SAME BACK CHANNELS APPEAR TO HAVE
CONTINUED TO BE USED BY BIDEN ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS. If so, that
would be when Twitter may have gone from a campaign ally to a
surrogate for state censorship. As I have previously written
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the administration cannot censor critics and cannot use agents for
that purpose under the First Amendment.

That is precisely what Musk is now alleging. As the documents were
being released, he tweeted
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“TWITTER ACTING BY ITSELF TO SUPPRESS FREE SPEECH IS NOT A 1ST
AMENDMENT VIOLATION, BUT ACTING UNDER ORDERS FROM THE GOVERNMENT TO
SUPPRESS FREE SPEECH, WITH NO JUDICIAL REVIEW, IS.”

The incoming Republican House majority has pledged to investigate —
and Musk has made that process far easier by making good on his pledge
of full transparency.

Washington has fully mobilized in its all-out war against Musk
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Yet, with a record number of users signing up with Twitter
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it seems clear the public is not buying censorship
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They want more, not less, free speech.

That may be why political figures such as Hillary Clinton have
enlisted foreign governments
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to compel the censoring of fellow citizens: If Twitter can’t be
counted on to censor, perhaps the European Union will be the ideal
surrogate
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to rid social media of these meddlesome posters.

THE RELEASE OF THESE DOCUMENTS HAS PRODUCED A LEVEL OF EXPOSURE RARELY
SEEN IN WASHINGTON, WHERE SUCH MATTERS USUALLY ARE SIMPLY
“HANDLED.” THE POLITICAL AND MEDIA ESTABLISHMENTS GENERALLY ARE
UNSTOPPABLE FORCES — BUT THEY MAY HAVE MET THEIR FIRST IMMOVABLE
OBJECT IN MUSK.

[Click Here. ACTNOW]
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