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Twitter maintained a “secret blacklist” of topics and accounts to prevent them from trending, according to data obtained by journalist Bari Weiss.
Conservative commentators like Dan Bongino and Charlie Kirk were deliberately put on a “search blacklist,” in Bongino’s case, or labeled “do not amplify,” in Kirk’s case.
Those who questioned the prevailing COVID orthodoxy of lockdowns and mask mandates, such as Stanford’s Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who argued that lockdowns harm children, were also put on a “search blacklist.”
Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s legal, political and trust director, denied that Twitter operated such blacklists.
“We don’t shadow ban,” he said in 2018, according to Weiss, speaking alongside Kayvon Beykpour, Twitter’s head of product.
They added: “And we certainly don’t do a shadow ban based on political views or ideologies.”
Weiss made the disclosures Thursday in the second installment of what has been dubbed The Twitter Files.
The documents detail how Twitter in October 2020 decided to censor The New York Post’s reporting of the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop. They feared that the content had been obtained through hacking, but had no evidence to prove it, and it quickly emerged that the laptop had simply been left at a repair shop.
Jack Dorsey, the then CEO of Twitter, admitted that censoring legitimate reporting was a significant mistake.
Conservative commentators Dan Bongino (left) and Charlie Kirk (right) were censored by Twitter, according to Bari Weiss.
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who argued that COVID lockdowns harmed children, was also put on a ‘search blacklist’ by Twitter, according to Weiss
The new owner of Twitter and ‘Head Twit’, Elon Musk, claimed on Wednesday that Twitter’s ‘most important’ data was ‘wiped’ and ‘hidden’ from the Dorsey.
Musk, 51, vowed that “everything we find will be published” as his newly acquired company continues to publish the Twitter files.
On Wednesday, Dorsey, 46, responded to Musk’s tweet about the delay of the second batch of Twitter files, asking the new CEO to “release everything” at once.
‘If the goal is transparency to build trust, why not post everything without a filter and let people judge for themselves? Including all the discussions about current and future actions? Dorsey wrote.
‘Make it all public now.’
Musk replied that everything would be disclosed, but even the “most important data was hidden (from [Dorsey] too) and some may have been removed.’
Elon Musk, 51, has vowed that “everything we find will be published” as Twitter continues to publish the files surrounding the Hunter Biden laptop scandal.
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, 46, called for transparency on Wednesday after Musk revealed that the second back of the Twitter files would be delayed.
‘If the goal is transparency to build trust, why not publish everything without a filter and let people judge for themselves?’ Dorsey wrote on Twitter
The delay came after the Tesla CEO fired James Baker, Twitter’s general counsel and former FBI general counsel, after discovering that he examined the first installment of the files, which were sent to Substack journalist Matt Taibbi. , and Common Sense editor Bari Weiss.
Musk fired Baker “in light of concerns about Baker’s potential role in suppressing information important to public dialogue.”
Taibbi revealed that Baker’s involvement in the first batch of files was “without the knowledge of the new administration.”
‘The process to produce the ‘Twitter Files’ involved delivery to two journalists (Bari Weiss and myself) through a lawyer close to the new management. However, after the initial batch, things got complicated,” Taibbi wrote on Twitter.
“Over the weekend, as we both dealt with roadblocks to further searches, it was @BariWeiss who discovered that the person in charge of releasing the files was someone named Jim. When he called to ask the last name of ‘Jim’, the answer was: ‘Jim Baker’.
Weiss said her ‘jaw hit the ground’ when she found out.
The first batch of files the two journalists received was titled Spectra Baker Emails.
The delay came after Twitter fired James Baker, the company’s general counsel, after discovering that he examined the first installment of Twitter’s files.
Musk fired Baker “in light of concerns about Baker’s potential role in suppressing information important to public dialogue.” Matt Taibbi, one of the journalists who received the first batch of files, revealed that Baker’s involvement in the first batch of files was “without the knowledge of the new administration.”
The first batch of internal documents showed Baker and other executives discussing Twitter’s October 2020 ban of a news report on Hunter’s foreign dealings, based on emails from his abandoned laptop.
On Friday, Taibbi released the batch of internal documents, calling them the “Twitter Files,” which included an exchange between Baker and former vice president of global communications Brandon Borrman.
Borrman asks, regarding the banning of an article about Hunter Biden under Twitter’s ‘hacked materials’ policy: ‘Can we honestly say that this is part of the policy?’
Baker responded, appearing to argue in favor of upholding the ban, because “caution is warranted.”
At the time, it was determined that the files had violated Twitter’s hacked materials policy, but Dorsey has since said the call was a mistake.
Critics accused Twitter of tilting the presidential election toward Biden by covering up the data.