Twitter briefly restricts Trump campaign account amid Republican outcry

By Elizabeth Culliford and Nandita Bose

 

U.S. President Donald Trump holds a campaign rally at Des Moines International Airport in Des Moines, Iowa, U.S., October 14, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

 

(Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's re-election campaign's Twitter account was briefly restricted from tweeting on Thursday, spurring an outcry from Republican lawmakers who accused social media companies of acting like "speech police" and vowing to hold Twitter responsible.

 

Twitter temporarily blocked the @TeamTrump account from sending tweets after it posted a video about Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden's son that it said violated its rules.

 

The video referred to a New York Post story from Wednesday that contained alleged details of Hunter Biden's business dealings with a Ukrainian energy company and said the former vice president had met with an adviser of the company.

 

Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement that Republican-led Senate committees have previously concluded that Joe Biden engaged in no wrongdoing related to Ukraine. He also denied such a meeting had taken place.

 

A Twitter spokesman told Reuters earlier on Thursday that the @TeamTrump account, as well as the accounts of White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany and the New York Post, had been blocked from tweeting due to the company's policies on hacked materials and posting private information. He said the accounts may need to delete the rule-breaking posts to continue tweeting.

 

The Trump campaign, with 2.2 million followers, was sending tweets again on Thursday afternoon. It said in a new tweet it was "re-posting the video Twitter doesn't want you to watch." A Twitter spokesman told Reuters that the site would not take action as alterations to the video meant it no longer violated its policies.

 

"It's going to all end up in a big lawsuit and there are things that can happen that are very severe that I'd rather not see happen, but it's probably going to have to," Trump said, when asked about the move by Twitter. Both Facebook Inc <FB.O> and Twitter took proactive steps on Wednesday to restrict dissemination of the Post story in the hours after it was published.

 

Facebook reduced how often the story shows up in users' news feeds and elsewhere on the Facebook platform, an action that spokesman Andy Stone said the company takes "if we have signals that a piece of content is false."

 

Facebook did not immediately respond to Reuters questions on whether its fact-checking partners were working on rating the NY Post's story.

 

Twitter prohibited its users from posting links to two New York Post articles about Hunter Biden, saying they violated its policy against posting private information and its "hacked materials" policy, which bars the distribution of content obtained through hacking that contains private information or trade secrets, or puts people at risk of physical harm.

 

But Twitter's Chief Executive Jack Dorsey tweeted on Wednesday saying "our communication around our actions on the @nypost article was not great. And blocking URL sharing via tweet or DM with zero context as to why we're blocking: unacceptable."

 

A Twitter spokesman declined to answer Reuters questions on whether Dorsey had been involved in the decisions on these restrictions on Wednesday or Thursday.

 

The House Judiciary Committee responded to Twitter's actions by tweeting a link to a copy of the New York Post's story on its website. Twitter blocked the link but later said this had been in error and reversed the action. Neither the @nypost or @kayleighmcenany accounts have tweeted in nearly a day, suggesting that they are still blocked from posting. The New York Post did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

SENDING SUBPOENAS

Republican lawmakers slammed the social media companies' actions on Thursday. U.S. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said the blocking of the story was "reprehensible" and that there should be no "speech police" in the United States.

 

After Twitter imposed the restrictions, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee moved to subpoena Dorsey.

 

Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham and Republican senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley said the committee will vote on sending the subpoena on Tuesday, Oct. 20 and plans to have Dorsey in front of the committee by Oct. 23. Senator Hawley also called for sending a subpoena to Facebook.

 

"We're going to finally have an accounting that is long overdue," Graham said. "This to me crystallizes the problem better than anything I could think of."

 

Senator Marco Rubio also urged Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to re-examine Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

 

The CEOs of Twitter, Facebook and Alphabet Inc's <GOOGL.O> Google are set to appear before the Senate Commerce Committee later this month at a hearing to discuss Section 230 - a legal immunity which offers tech companies protection from liability over content posted by users and enables them to act in "good faith" to remove objectionable content.

 

The calls to reform Section 230 and penalize tech companies has been intensifying but it is unlikely there will be action on the law by Congress this year.

 

(Reporting by Elizabeth Culliford in London and Nandita Bose in Washington; Additional reporting by Munsif Vengattil in Bengaluru, David Shepardson and Susan Cornwell in Washington and Katie Paul in San Francisco; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli and Lisa Shumaker)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-10-16

 

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Good for them this enuendo /slander manufacturerd  fake news stuffs not going to fly anymore good!

I think Trump's lies and disregard for people's safety are coming home to roost. Good that Facebook and Twitter are showing some resolve but probably because of the overwhelming contempt for Trump in the community. They say 90 per cent chance of Biden winning.

I think Trump's bag of tricks e.g. Hunter Biden, coronavirus isn't so bad, crime and chaos in the suburbs, is looking a bit weak. He is so dumb not to have safe rallies too.

He needs a good caravan of immigrants from Guatemala or something that he and Fox News can use to get the scare factor happening. 

48 minutes ago, Tug said:

Good for them this enuendo /slander manufacturerd  fake news stuffs not going to fly anymore good!

All of the Russian collusion, which turned out to be false, was not manufactured fake news?  That was all good with Twitter and FB.  Do you think people don't see the hypocrisy here?

36 minutes ago, Fat is a type of crazy said:

I think Trump's lies and disregard for people's safety are coming home to roost. Good that Facebook and Twitter are showing some resolve but probably because of the overwhelming contempt for Trump in the community. They say 90 per cent chance of Biden winning.

I think Trump's bag of tricks e.g. Hunter Biden, coronavirus isn't so bad, crime and chaos in the suburbs, is looking a bit weak. He is so dumb not to have safe rallies too.

He needs a good caravan of immigrants from Guatemala or something that he and Fox News can use to get the scare factor happening. 

Twitter's and FB's actions regarding the New York Post story are in marked contrast to their non-action regarding so much Russian collusion reports that turned out to be fake news yet never flagged the same be these social media companies.  Therefore a strong case can be made that Twitter and FB are engaging in election interference.  The Senate is looking to subpoena Jack.

 

My only other comment, for now, would be regarding my observation that there are many, many people in the west who seem to want nothing more than to implement a Chinese approach to the flow of information.  In essence, 'authorities,' or those who are part of the 'club,' determine what information is to be approved for public consumption and all other information is harshly censored.  Supported only by the people who side with the 'club.'

 

Of course that opinion will be countered by the argument that it's all for the safety of the people who can't separate fact from fiction.  Why is it that the reason for denying freedoms is always in the name of 'safety'?

If the evidence off of these alleged Biden laptops is bona fide then it is plain that Joe Biden is in a serious position of being compromised and therefore a national security risk to the U.S. if he were elected president.  Can't have that.

Why only briefly.

9 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

If the evidence off of these alleged Biden laptops is bona fide then it is plain that Joe Biden is in a serious position of being compromised and therefore a national security risk to the U.S. if he were elected president.  Can't have that.

Is it too late for the democrats act decisively, nip this in the bud and field a new candidate? Make Harris the Presidential candidate and bring in another for VP? Has this situation where the prime candidate is compromised beyond all hope just a couple of weeks before the election ever happened before? What a fascinating train wreck to watch.

27 minutes ago, TopDeadSenter said:

 The problem the left have with this data trove, which will be released drip drip getting ever more salacious and incriminating, is that nobody is doubting they are genuine, they are just so so inconvenient.

No one is doubting they are genuine? Really? The story of a conspiracy theory spouting computer repair guy that Hunter Biden left his laptop at the store and never picked it up has no one doubting his truthfulness? That it was released via Rudolph Giuliani who conspired with Russian agents and various lowlifes to promote false conspiracy theories has inspired no doubts?

An explosive New York Post story that sent Trumpworld into a frenzy is riddled with holes and red flags

"Business Insider identified the repair-shop owner as John Paul Mac Isaac, an avid Trump supporter who couldn't get his facts straight when reporters later questioned him about the timeline of events laid out in the Post's story.

The outlet also said it learned of the emails' existence last month through Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist, and obtained them through Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump's personal lawyer.

Both men have pushed conspiracy theories about the Biden campaign's ties to Ukraine, and Giuliani met last year with a Ukrainian official who was sanctioned in September and accused of acting as a Russian agent."

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-post-hunter-joe-biden-giuliani-red-flags-disinformation-2020-10

1 hour ago, webfact said:

Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement that Republican-led Senate committees have previously concluded that Joe Biden engaged in no wrongdoing related to Ukraine. He also denied such a meeting had taken place.

Yes, the Biden campaign has stated that this alleged meeting with Biden and Vadym Pozharsky did not take place because Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time show no meeting.

 

It's only logical that a criminal's first and foremost consideration when committing a crime, aside from the intention of actually committing the crime, is to conceal it.  Logically it would follow that holding a meeting involving criminality would need to be hidden, or off the books.  This point is not raised by the MSM as they attempt to use the absence of a meeting from Biden's official schedule as proof that the meeting never took place.  Therefore the only logical and plausible conclusion one can draw from the MSM's failure to mention this point is that they're involved in helping to cover up and protect Joe Biden.

14 minutes ago, TopDeadSenter said:

Is it too late for the democrats act decisively, nip this in the bud and field a new candidate? Make Harris the Presidential candidate and bring in another for VP? Has this situation where the prime candidate is compromised beyond all hope just a couple of weeks before the election ever happened before? What a fascinating train wreck to watch.

 

I think you are on the right track here. Removal of Biden has been on the cards all summer, but the Dems were hoping they could get him across the line just in time.

 

Doubtful though that the Dems would shove KH into the top spot, given her less than glorious vote record in the Primaries. They would probably get some bigwig in at this last moment.  Male or female?  Half-white? Who cares....

34 minutes ago, placeholder said:

No one is doubting they are genuine? Really? The story of a conspiracy theory spouting computer repair guy that Hunter Biden left his laptop at the store and never picked it up has no one doubting his truthfulness? That it was released via Rudolph Giuliani who conspired with Russian agents and various lowlifes to promote false conspiracy theories has inspired no doubts?

An explosive New York Post story that sent Trumpworld into a frenzy is riddled with holes and red flags

"Business Insider identified the repair-shop owner as John Paul Mac Isaac, an avid Trump supporter who couldn't get his facts straight when reporters later questioned him about the timeline of events laid out in the Post's story.

The outlet also said it learned of the emails' existence last month through Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist, and obtained them through Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump's personal lawyer.

Both men have pushed conspiracy theories about the Biden campaign's ties to Ukraine, and Giuliani met last year with a Ukrainian official who was sanctioned in September and accused of acting as a Russian agent."

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-post-hunter-joe-biden-giuliani-red-flags-disinformation-2020-10

John Paul Mac Isaac also claimed that he alerted the FBI.  The FBI confiscated the laptops as well.  Should be easy enough to verify that, wouldn't it?  If nothing else a report should exist.  I'll repeat, should exist.  I reiterate since the FBI has produced recent classified documentation that turns out has been requested for years yet not made available until recently.  Who can one trust these days?

 

BTW, here's the New York Post article with the federal subpoena showing the computer and hard drive were seized by the FBI.  See for yourself.

 

Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad

 

Kinda blows Joe Scarborough's, Mika Brzezinski's, Business Insider's, and your conspiracy theory outta the water, doesn't it?

 

Edited October 16, 20205 yr by Tippaporn

6 minutes ago, placeholder said:

No one is doubting they are genuine? Really? The story of a conspiracy theory spouting computer repair guy that Hunter Biden left his laptop at the store and never picked it up has no one doubting his truthfulness? That it was released via Rudolph Giuliani who conspired with Russian agents and various lowlifes to promote false conspiracy theories has inspired no doubts?

An explosive New York Post story that sent Trumpworld into a frenzy is riddled with holes and red flags

"Business Insider identified the repair-shop owner as John Paul Mac Isaac, an avid Trump supporter who couldn't get his facts straight when reporters later questioned him about the timeline of events laid out in the Post's story.

The outlet also said it learned of the emails' existence last month through Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist, and obtained them through Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump's personal lawyer.

Both men have pushed conspiracy theories about the Biden campaign's ties to Ukraine, and Giuliani met last year with a Ukrainian official who was sanctioned in September and accused of acting as a Russian agent."

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-post-hunter-joe-biden-giuliani-red-flags-disinformation-2020-10

If you have been paying attention, many MSM narratives are crumbling over the last few days. Steve Scully admitting he was NOT hacked(remember this from last week?) should be a major wakeup call. The debates was rigged, they used a neverTrump moderator. The left said no way. Now Scully admits he lied and was not hacked. Same will happen with this huge data trove. Occam's razor says it is real, the video and photos tend to prove the veracity of the claims they were really from Hunter's computer. I fail to see how people can try denying this?

I'd be tempted to shut down Trump altogether, on the grounds he uses Twitter to distribute lies, hatred, racism and ad hominem attacks on anyone who doesn't adore him.

3 minutes ago, TopDeadSenter said:

If you have been paying attention, many MSM narratives are crumbling over the last few days. Steve Scully admitting he was NOT hacked(remember this from last week?) should be a major wakeup call. The debates was rigged, they used a neverTrump moderator. The left said no way. Now Scully admits he lied and was not hacked. Same will happen with this huge data trove. Occam's razor says it is real, the video and photos tend to prove the veracity of the claims they were really from Hunter's computer. I fail to see how people can try denying this?

Sure. Makes sense. A laptop computer from Hunter Biden is left loaded with damaging information is left at a repair store and never picked up. 

This raises the question, too, that if the FBI did indeed have Hunter Biden's laptops in their possession, and if indeed there was evidence of Biden criminality contained therein, and if indeed the FBI's possession of these laptops and incriminating contents occurred before the impeachment of Trump then why was this exculpatory information in defense of Trump withheld?

45 minutes ago, TopDeadSenter said:

Is it too late for the democrats act decisively, nip this in the bud and field a new candidate? Make Harris the Presidential candidate and bring in another for VP? Has this situation where the prime candidate is compromised beyond all hope just a couple of weeks before the election ever happened before? What a fascinating train wreck to watch.

Perhaps they can run Harris but she would have to choose a VP.  Bernie?

25 minutes ago, TopDeadSenter said:

35 minutes ago, placeholder said:

No one is doubting they are genuine? Really? The story of a conspiracy theory spouting computer repair guy that Hunter Biden left his laptop at the store and never picked it up has no one doubting his truthfulness? That it was released via Rudolph Giuliani who conspired with Russian agents and various lowlifes to promote false conspiracy theories has inspired no doubts?

An explosive New York Post story that sent Trumpworld into a frenzy is riddled with holes and red flags

"Business Insider identified the repair-shop owner as John Paul Mac Isaac, an avid Trump supporter who couldn't get his facts straight when reporters later questioned him about the timeline of events laid out in the Post's story.

The outlet also said it learned of the emails' existence last month through Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist, and obtained them through Rudy Giuliani, President Donald Trump's personal lawyer.

Both men have pushed conspiracy theories about the Biden campaign's ties to Ukraine, and Giuliani met last year with a Ukrainian official who was sanctioned in September and accused of acting as a Russian agent."

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-york-post-hunter-joe-biden-giuliani-red-flags-disinformation-2020-10

If you have been paying attention, many MSM narratives are crumbling over the last few days. Steve Scully admitting he was NOT hacked(remember this from last week?) should be a major wakeup call. The debates was rigged, they used a neverTrump moderator. The left said no way. Now Scully admits he lied and was not hacked. Same will happen with this huge data trove. Occam's razor says it is real, the video and photos tend to prove the veracity of the claims they were really from Hunter's computer. I fail to see how people can try denying this?

Again and again and again the MSM has reported 'truths' which turn out to be false.  And yet again and again and again people here believe them.  It defies sanity.

11 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

This raises the question, too, that if the FBI did indeed have Hunter Biden's laptops in their possession, and if indeed there was evidence of Biden criminality contained therein, and if indeed the FBI's possession of these laptops and incriminating contents occurred before the impeachment of Trump then why was this exculpatory information in defense of Trump withheld?

Just possibly because they judged that it was fake and not exculpatory?

30 minutes ago, placeholder said:

Sure. Makes sense. A laptop computer from Hunter Biden is left loaded with damaging information is left at a repair store and never picked up. 

Is it that difficult to believe Biden would be so irresponsible?  It's not the first time Hunter left some of his possessions behind.

 

Washington Examiner - Cocaine pipe and ‘white powdery substance’ found in Hunter Biden’s rental car in 2016

 

You might have noticed one of the photos provided by the New York Post picturing Hunter asleep with a crack pipe in his mouth.  Yes, makes no sense to you.  LOL

 

BTW, here's the New York Post article with the federal subpoena showing the computer and hard drive were seized by the FBI.  It also shows the receipt from the shop for the service performed with Hunter's name and phone number listed.  See for yourself.

 

Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad

 

Edited October 16, 20205 yr by Tippaporn

29 minutes ago, placeholder said:

Sure. Makes sense. A laptop computer from Hunter Biden is left loaded with damaging information is left at a repair store and never picked up. 

And the damaging information is released as a PDF, not the emails itself. The pdf was created at the same time as giuliani was in Ukraine, and was released by giuliani.

4 minutes ago, placeholder said:

16 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

This raises the question, too, that if the FBI did indeed have Hunter Biden's laptops in their possession, and if indeed there was evidence of Biden criminality contained therein, and if indeed the FBI's possession of these laptops and incriminating contents occurred before the impeachment of Trump then why was this exculpatory information in defense of Trump withheld?

Just possibly because they judged that it was fake and not exculpatory?

Possibly.  But probably not.  How many examples would I need to post of the U.S. government withholding critical and damning information?

3 minutes ago, stevenl said:

35 minutes ago, placeholder said:

Sure. Makes sense. A laptop computer from Hunter Biden is left loaded with damaging information is left at a repair store and never picked up. 

And the damaging information is released as a PDF, not the emails itself. The pdf was created at the same time as giuliani was in Ukraine, and was released by giuliani.

You'll need to provide hard, conclusive evidence of that claim, stevenl.  I'll demand it.

11 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

You'll need to provide hard, conclusive evidence of that claim, stevenl.  I'll demand it.

That information has been confirmed online already. https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-laptop-real-fake-russian-intelligence-2020-10

Edited October 16, 20205 yr by stevenl

59 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

Yes, the Biden campaign has stated that this alleged meeting with Biden and Vadym Pozharsky did not take place because Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time show no meeting.

 

It's only logical that a criminal's first and foremost consideration when committing a crime, aside from the intention of actually committing the crime, is to conceal it.  Logically it would follow that holding a meeting involving criminality would need to be hidden, or off the books.  This point is not raised by the MSM as they attempt to use the absence of a meeting from Biden's official schedule as proof that the meeting never took place.  Therefore the only logical and plausible conclusion one can draw from the MSM's failure to mention this point is that they're involved in helping to cover up and protect Joe Biden.

What crime would have been committed had Biden and Pozharsky actually met? What service did Biden provide him?

14 minutes ago, Tippaporn said:

Possibly.  But probably not.  How many examples would I need to post of the U.S. government withholding critical and damning information?

You mean with the head of the FBI having been appointed by Trump and William Barr being the Attorney General? Rational people use Occam's razor to decide such things. Others use Occam's cesspool.

3 minutes ago, placeholder said:

What crime would have been committed had Biden and Pozharsky actually met? What service did Biden provide him?

Congratulations, first time I've seen a pertinent question on this thread. The rest is sound and fury, signifying nothing.

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Facebook reduced how often the story shows up in users' news feeds and elsewhere on the Facebook platform, an action that spokesman Andy Stone said the company takes "if we have signals that a piece of content is false."

My observation is that there are many, many people in the west who seem to want nothing more than to implement a Chinese approach to the flow of information.  In essence, 'authorities,' or those who are part of the 'club,' determine what information is to be approved for public consumption and all other information is harshly censored.  Supported only by the people who side with the 'club.'

1 hour ago, placeholder said:

Sure. Makes sense. A laptop computer from Hunter Biden is left loaded with damaging information is left at a repair store and never picked up. 

 

He's his father's son.....

1 hour ago, Tippaporn said:

All of the Russian collusion, which turned out to be false, was not manufactured fake news?  That was all good with Twitter and FB.  Do you think people don't see the hypocrisy here?

Pinned.