Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) revealed Monday night that he spoke with Twitter owner Elon Musk about the social media company’s plan for the future—calling their conversation part of the company’s “road map.”
At the same time, Cruz managed to lay out his standard menu of criticisms of Democrats, “big tech” and others who had allegedly committed some sort of “collusion.”
Appearing on Hannity, the Texas Republican was asked to give context to a letter he sent earlier in the day to Twitter, as well as Meta, Google and TikTok, announcing the investigation into these platforms’ content recommendation systems.
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“I launched a full investigation into ‘big tech’ censorship, where we are going to take the ‘Twitter Files’...[and] what Elon Musk has made public and use that as a road map to go after…all of Big Tech that is trying to silence conservatives,” said Cruz, a ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee. “And we’re going to bring accountability, we’re going to bring transparency, and we’re going to shine a light and expose their collusion with Democrats in the deep state to try to silence conservatives.”
Despite Cruz’s vow, House hearings on the matter have thus far been underwhelming for those seeking to prove “censorship” of conservative voices, with former Twitter officials testifying last week that Republicans and Donald Trump himself petitioned the company to remove undesirable tweets.
Although Musk’s “Twitter Files” instead focused on communications to Twitter by Democrats and government agencies, Hannity insisted Monday that the files really did expose how “corrupt” things were at the company before Musk purchased it last fall.
Cruz then praised the buy as a “big damn deal.” He claimed it shows that Musk, who has lashed out against the “leftist agenda,” pushed voters toward the GOP, and temporarily banned reporters who cover him critically, is committed to free speech.
“Last week I spent over a half hour on the phone with Elon talking to him about what he is finding at Twitter and using that as a road map,” Cruz said. “And I have to tell you that the folks at Google and YouTube and Facebook and Tik Tok — they are losing their minds because a member of the club wasn’t supposed to admit it,” he added, referring to alleged “collusion.”
