Et tu, Elon? The day after clinching an agreement to buy Twitter and take it private for a cool $44 billion, the Tesla chief made more of his opinions on digital freedom of speech known, calling the platform’s 2020 freezing of the New York Post’s account in the wake of its story on Hunter Biden’s laptop “incredibly inappropriate.” After Saagar Enjeti, a media personality known for hosting The Hill web show Rising prior to the notorious “no b.s. broadcaster” Kim Iversen’s tenure, mentioned the laptop story in a tweet, Musk responded: “Suspending the Twitter account of a major news organization for publishing a truthful story was obviously incredibly inappropriate.” Both Twitter and Facebook took action in October 2020 to limit the distribution of the Post’s then-unconfirmed claims about President Joe Biden’s son, limiting users from sharing links to the story. For roughly two weeks, Twitter also locked the Post out of its account. Although ex-CEO Jack Dorsey later said the move had been a “mistake,” the Federal Election Commission determined in 2021 that the platform’s suffocation of the story did not violate election laws. At least some of the contents of the laptop have since been vetted and authenticated by The New York Times.
Suspending the Twitter account of a major news organization for publishing a truthful story was obviously incredibly inappropriate
