The Twitter Files
Elon Musk
Elon Musk purchased Twitter on October 27, 2022, and at that time promised change. One of the outcomes has been the release of several "Twitter Files” that have led to revelations about heavy-handed influence of various governmental agencies that pressured Twitter leadership to censor the speech of American Twitter users. Thus far, there have been 12 Twitter Files that have been released based on the investigation of internal Twitter documents by Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, Michael Shellenberger, M.D., Lee Fang, and David Zweig. Below is a brief synopsis of the 12 Twitter Files.
Twitter File #1: How Twitter Let the Intelligence Community In (The Hunter Biden Laptop Story)
(Matt Taibbi w/Bari Weiss- December 2, 2022)
This Twitter File concerns the suppression of information related to the Hunter Biden Laptop Story. In October 2022, leading up to the 2022 Presidential Election, the New York Post (NYP) released a story, as originally posted on Twitter, that exposed the contents of the Hunter Biden laptop. Twitter banned the story and then told the public that it banned the story because it was “hacked materials.” This was based on a false report from the FBI. Twitter File #1 show that Twitter executives were aware that the Hunter Biden laptop had not, in fact, been hacked. Another a part of Twitter File #1 is the existence of a poll of Democratic Congress members that they wanted Twitter to moderate (i.e., censor) more posts, not less because, “the First Amendment isn’t absolute.” Let that sink in.
As a part of this initial investigation of internal Twitter documents, Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi learned that Twitter’s Deputy General Counsel was Jim Baker, former FBI General counsel. Upon learning that Baker was general counsel and that he was screening all of the documents before he would allow them to be released to the journalists., Baker was released from his employment with Twitter.
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1610372352872783872?s=20&t=x3Gs2m9x866kTgO_arclcg
Twitter File #2: Secret Blacklists
(Bari Weiss - December 8, 2022)
Twitter File #2 sought to find out if Twitter users were being banned or somehow filtered such that their Tweets were not viewable by others, to whatever degree. It was discovered that Twitter had in place a council, called SIP-PES, that decided which high-visibility controversial (RE: conservative) accounts should have their posts not be as visible on Twitter. This was a process that they called “visibility filtering,” which was a way of suppressing the posts of those targeted accounts. Actions taken included “Search Blacklist” (searching a particular account would not bring up their names), as well as placing them on a “Trends Blacklist” or a category called “Do Not Amplify,” which disallowed the posts of certain accounts from being shared. Among those accounts targeted by Twitter were Dan Bongino (conservative political commentator), Jay Bhattacharya, M.D. (Stanford professor), and Charlie Kirk (conservative political talk show host. https://twitter.com/bariweiss/status/1601007575633305600?s=20&t=x3Gs2m9x866kTgO_arclcg
Twitter File #3: Removal of President Donald Trump October 2020 - January 6, 2021
(Matt Taibbi - 12/09/2022)
This File goes into the decision leading up to the permanent banning of President Trump from Twitter following January 6. Review of the documents of Twitter File #3 revealed that Twitter employees had concerns about banning President Trump as doing so did not conform with their “public interest policy.” https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601352083617505281?s=20&t=x3Gs2m9x866kTgO_arclcg
Twitter File #4: The Removal of President Donald Trump - January 7, 2022
(Michael Shellenberger - December 10, 2022)
Mr. Shellenberger investigated Twitter documents from the day after J6 and the “riots” at the capitol. These documents show that at that point, Twitter executives are going out of their way to augment the interpretation of Twitter policies to allow for the permanent banning of President Trump from the platform. Again, employee emails reference to the company going down a “slippery slope.” There is also a discussion of banning Congressman Matt Gaetz despite the fact that their policies did not show Matt Gaetz failing to follow the policies in any of his tweets.
https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/1601720455005511680?s=20&t=ih7m8j5DdtjY8oRTm4h8uA
Twitter File #5: The Removal of President Donald Trump January 8, 2022
(Bari Weiss - 12/11/2022)
Internal Twitter documents show that although Twitter staff members were not fans of President Trump, they were struggling with his ultimate suspension from the website because his January tweet was NOT thought to be an incitement of violence. Staff members were ultimately over-ruled by executives (Gadde; Roth) who compared those staff members to those who were only followers Nazi orders.
https://twitter.com/bariweiss/status/1602364197194432515?s=20&t=8Cm2-djzAJBCrg57VVXUkg
Twitter Files #6: Twitter, The FBI Subsidiary
(12/16/2022 - Matt Taibbi)
At this point of the collective journalists’ review of internal Twitter documents, it becomes evident that the FBI is putting significant pressure on Twitter to censor certain accounts as it relates to various topics. In Twitter File #6, it is shown that the FBI is consistently sending lists of accounts that they wish for Twitter to handle via censorship via shadow-banning and minimizing their visibility to Twitter users. https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1603857534737072128?s=20&t=PM8_rrXSyjM1YrAiLacP6Q
Twitter File #7: The FBI and Hunter Biden’s Laptop
(Michael Shellenberger, M.D. - 12/19/2022)
In Twitter File #7, the review of Twitter documents reveals that the federal law enforcement agencies have intensified their communication with Twitter leading up to the release of the NYPost’s release of the story about the Hunter Biden laptop. SF FBI Agent, Elvis Chan, is noted as sending multiple documents to Yoel Roth (Twitter’s Head of Site Integrity) through a channel referred to as a “Teleporter.” This is a one-way channel by which the FBI transmitted to Twitter directives as it relates to suppression of various accounts and news stories (such as the Hunter Biden laptop revelation). This File also reveals that Baker confirms that Twitter has been compensated over $3M since October 2019 for doing the bid of the FBI.
https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/1604871630613753856?s=20&t=9C38MTNAgE84x2NR95jK-w
Twitter #8 & 9: How Twitter Quietly Aided the Pentagon’s Covert Online Psyop Campaign & Twitter and “Other Government Agencies”
(Lee Fang - December 20, 2022 & Matt Taibbi - December 24, 2022)
Surprising many of us, it is discovered by Fang & Taibbi from further review of Twitter internal documents that beginning in 2017, the Pentagon completed many “covert operations” using Twitter’s reach. US Central Command, otherwise known as CENTCOM), the CIA, and the Department of Homeland Security communicated with such social media platforms as Twitter, Facebook, and likely Yahoo!, Twitch, Cloudfare, LinkedIn, and Wikimedia about amplifying and/or flagging accounts and content on their platforms.
https://twitter.com/lhfang/status/1605292454261182464?s=20&t=HvqB8jXgbY3zg-tTbGBlfA
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1606701397109796866?s=20&t=gG1eAZuryhhPzdir_V4GkA
Twitter #10: How Twitter Rigged the COVID Debate
(David Zweig - December 28, 2022)
In what many of us knew was occurring, but could not prove until the release of this Twitter File, we learn that Twitter, at the direction of White House officials, suppressed information about COVID by “discrediting doctors and other experts who disagrees” with the White House narrative as it relates to the source of COVID, masking, lockdowns, the safety of mRNA vaccines, including peer-reviewed studies as it relates to the vaccines. This is not the much anticipated “Fauci Files” that have yet to be released.
https://twitter.com/davidzweig/status/1607378386338340867?s=20&t=hLjwkiOR1kfGzWylxMJ9MQ
Twitter Files #11: How Twitter Let the Intelligence Community in & #12: Twitter and the FBI “Belly Button”
(Matt Taibbi - January 3, 2022)
Here we learn about the continued and expanding pressure placed on Twitter from Summer 2020 to present by the FBI, Congress, and the media to lead the American public to believe that certain content was Russian disinformation. Much of the information that was alleged to be Russian information has since been shown NOT to be of Russian origin and was in fact truthful. Agencies involved in suppressing the truth include US Treasury, HHS, NSA, FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and various politicians, such as Adam Schiff (who’s request to have journalist Paul Sperry suspended was allowed).
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1610372352872783872?s=20&t=DPr7RzEGiFe4kNi-t-Mbow
Please note that in accessing the above links, you must continue through the each of the successive posts that is known as a “thread.”
