A number of prominent left-leaning X users who’ve been highly critical of billionaires Elon Musk and Bill Ackman, as well as the Israeli military action in Gaza, were suddenly and inexplicably banned on Tuesday by the social-media platform.
Among those suspended were Intercept national security reporter Ken Klippenstein and Texas Observer journalist Steven Monacelli. Additionally, other booted accounts with high follower counts included the TrueAnon podcast, Twitch streamer Rob Rousseau, along with users @RyanShead, @zei_squirrel, and @theliamnissan.
While no explanation or reason was immediately given for the suspensions, speculation immediately arose that those users’ overt criticism of Musk and Ackman—who helped lead a right-wing push to oust Harvard president Claudine Gay and has since bullied media outlets for reporting on his wife’s plagiarism—was behind the bans.
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Prior to this article’s publication, most of the accounts were reactivated without any further explanation. Musk and Twitter did not respond to requests for comment.
“[I] lived bitch,” Klippenstein tweeted after his account was reinstated.
Shortly after the suspensions were handed out, for instance, the hashtag #FreeLiamNissan began trending on X, with users noting that satirical account @theliamnissan had recently nicknamed Musk “Apartheid Clyde” for pushing a version of the racist “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory.
In a statement to The Daily Dot’s Mikael Thalen, Monacelli said he was given no explanation for why his account was suddenly wiped out on Tuesday morning but he suspected it had something to do with his critical reporting on Musk.
“I haven’t received any communications from Twitter/X about why I have been suspended,” Monacelli wrote. “I can’t think of anything I’ve posted lately that would be worthy of suspension. Although I have written multiple multiple critical reports about Twitter/X and Elon Musk in recent months.”
The Texas Observer also weighed in, tweeting directly at Musk and the platform’s support account to ask why their reporter had been suspended.
Klippenstein and The Intercept didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. However, several of Klippenstein’s colleagues blasted Musk for the suspension, blasting the X owner for once again betraying his self-described “free speech absolutist” principles.
“It’s so pathetically ironic that @elonmusk is purging the few remaining left wing accounts who stuck around because we really do believe in an open exchange of ideas even with people we vehemently disagree with,” tweeted The Intercept’s D.C. bureau chief Ryan Grim. “You know who doesn't actually believe in that? @elonmusk.”
Intercept writer Murtaza Hussain added: “This is crazy because this is a person who actually does real reporting with classified documents and sources.”
While the exact reason for Klippenstein’s suspension is unknown, the reporter did write a Substack post last month detailing how Musk discussed with the Israeli military its use artificial intelligence in its bombing campaign in Gaza.
Attorney Beth Bourdon, who regularly assists Klippenstein on Freedom of Information Act requests, speculated that Musk has been looking to remove Klippenstein from the platform for roughly a year due to the Intercept journalist’s coverage of him.
“[E]lon musk started his campaign against ken a year ago,” Bourdon tweeted. “[O]n jan 10, 2023, ken published a story on tesla using video i received under a public records request.”
After sharing a link to Klippenstein’s story last year about Tesla’s “problematic autopilot features,” Bourdon added: “[I] feel like whatever is going on with these suspensions, if there was a way for elon to suspend ken now since he couldn’t last january, he was going to do it.”
After a couple of hours, however, Klippenstein’s account was back. Linking to his Substack post about Musk and Israel, he stated there was a “backstory to this” before urging followers to subscribe to his newsletter.
Monacelli’s account was also reactivated on Tuesday afternoon. “It would be so funny if I broke 100k followers after being suspended and then reinstated by a man known for making dumb decisions while high,” he snarked about the reversal, referencing recent reports about Musk’s illegal drug use.
Both Monacelli and Klippenstein tweeted on Tuesday afternoon that after lifting the suspensions, X did not provide any explanations for why their accounts were banned in the first place.
While Musk and Twitter have not commented on the suspensions, it would appear the edgelord billionaire lifted the bans after far-right conspiracy theorist Jackson Hinkle asked why X was suspending accounts that have been critical of Israel. (Hinkle himself has exploited left-wing pro-Palestinian sentiment to peddle antisemitic conspiracies.)
“I will investigate. Obviously, it is ok to be critical of anything, but it is not ok to call for extreme violence, as that is illegal,” Musk tweeted at Hinkle. “(Apart from the “UN Exemption”, where officials from countries recognized by the UN can say what they say at the UN). For the record, I do not personally agree with your views. Nonetheless, the point of freedom of speech is allowing those whose views you disagree with to express those views.”
The account @zei_squirrel, which has long criticized U.S. foreign policy in Israel, was also reactivated just before this article’s publication. Prior to returning to X, the writer took to their Substack newsletter to suggest that Ackman was involved in the suspension.
“I didn’t even have the opportunity to delete a post that supposedly infringes on Twitter’s rules. No, that cunt scumbag Elon Musk, likely at the behest of his buddy Bill Ackman who I have been embarrassing over the past few days, just banned me,” @zei_squirrel wrote. “No reason given. Not even an attempt to justify it. No, just suspended me because his billionaire buddy didn’t like my posts about him.”
The writer continued: “This is the only reason I can think of for why I would be suspended now, as my posts have not changed in any way from the past few months or years in content. No, it’s because I went after Bill Ackman.”
This isn’t the first time Musk has banned reporters from his platform despite claiming to believe in completely unencumbered free speech. Just weeks after he first bought Twitter in late 2022, he suspended several high-profile journalists who’d reported critically of his takeover, including reporters from CNN, The Washington Post and The New York Times.
After initially justifying the bans by claiming the journalists had doxxed him, he eventually lifted the suspensions following a Twitter poll that found the majority of users on the site disagreed with his decision.
