Now that the Republicans control the House it’s time to have hearings about how Twitter collaborated with government agencies to censor people and tightly control the narratives about everything from “Russia collusion” to Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Today the House Oversight Committee is focusing on Twitter and how the company under previous ownership took marching orders from the FBI/DOJ to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story. We told you earlier that Dem Rep. Jamie Raskin referred to the House probe into the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story and revelations in a few rounds of Twitter Files as a “trivial” matter and a waste of time.
Democrats flailing and trying to dismiss the Twitter Files as a trivial bunch of nothing is the best evidence that what’s known is damning and they sure don’t want anybody digging deeper.
Michael Shellenberger has been sharing some Twitter Files to fact-check and highlight testimony and claims being made during the Oversight Committee hearing:
TWITTER FILES: CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS
Twitter executives, including fmr FBI lawyer Jim Baker, who served as Twitter Deputy Counsel, are about to testify in front of the House Oversight Committee about their handling of the Hunter Biden laptop
Let’s gohttps://t.co/HSyrVnXp12
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Witnesses: Jim Baker, Vijaya Gadde, Yoel Roth, Anika Collier Navaroli pic.twitter.com/DnQ1glruD7
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
BACKGROUNDhttps://t.co/UAkzcxtJe8
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
And here we go…
Baker claims he urged caution around the Hunter Biden laptop when in reality he led the charge within Twitter to reverse the finding by Twitter Head of Trust and Safety Yoel Roth that the NY Post story had *not* violated Twitter policieshttps://t.co/45wFmNeDYe
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Baker repeatedly and forcefully urged Roth and other Twitter executives to censor and thus discredit the NY Post story. After he did so, Roth reversed his decision, and censored the story. pic.twitter.com/ugejpBrs82
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Sometimes what isn’t said is as telling as what is said:
Vijaye Gadde, the former general counsel of Twitter, claims that its censorship of the NY Post article was done in line with its policy against hacked materials, but she does not mention that Roth & his team found they were *not* from hacking. https://t.co/Gn19rmFLEl
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
There was extremely strong evidence the Hunter Biden emails were authentic and *not* the result of hacking. The @nypost included a picture of the receipt signed by Hunter Biden and an FBI subpoena proving it had taken possession of the laptop.https://t.co/yB0qQ1fEbm
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
It would have taken a few minutes for Jim Baker, Yoel Roth, Vijaye Gadde to confirm whether the FBI subpoena was real or fake. None of them did so.
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Can’t say we’re surprised.
Yoel Roth, like Vijaye, opens his statement describing content moderation decisions that are not particularly controversial, such as against hate speech. This has been a strategy from many Twitter execs & defenders, including regime media.
The real issue here is disinformation.
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth says that Twitter’s mistake was due to his memory of Russia’s hack & leak of DNC emails in 2016.
He fails to mention that he himself said FBI repeatedly primed him in 2020 to dismiss reports of the laptop as another Russian disinfo operation. https://t.co/VbUPuhLkDS
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
There’s also been a fair amount of attempts to change the subject (which Dems on the committee certainly support):
The Democrats put forward a former Twitter exec. as a witness who says, “I was not involved in the decision around Hunter Biden’s laptop,” which is the main topic of this hearing. She then changes the topic to January 6. pic.twitter.com/QL7642tB7b
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
The Republicans are, however, remaining focused:
.@RepAndyBiggsAZ asks Roth, “Were there experts… you consulted between 9 am and 10:15 am,” when Roth reversed his decision.
Roth says, “We were following this discussion as it unfolded on Twitter… and that informed Twitter’s judgement”
No mention of Baker.
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth says he regrets his tweet saying there were “ACTUAL NAZIS IN THE WHITE HOUSE” and that he doesn’t think all conservatives are Nazis pic.twitter.com/W8RevJgcx8
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Oh, well that was nice of Roth.
Gadde says that Hunter Biden never told Twitter that he was a victim of a hack
Gadde says she did not contact Biden’s lawyer to ask if the laptop was authentic pic.twitter.com/3uWtMQwvIk
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Baker says that he did not talk to his FBI contacts about the Hunter Biden laptop on October 14, the day the NY Post published its article.
We know that at 3:38 pm that day, Baker arranged a phone call with the General Counsel of the FBI. https://t.co/cFCsEcZDEK
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth confirms that he was warned in meetings with intelligence agencies and other social media companies that there could be a hack and leak operation involving Hunter Biden, but adds that the Hunter Biden info may have come from another social media firmhttps://t.co/x7wqfC51nw
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth does not say which firm that was, but it is notable that when Joe Rogan asked Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg about the Hunter Biden laptop, Zuckerberg said his staff was warned by FBI of a coming Russian hack and dump operationhttps://t.co/OtX9WKb2xQ
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth says FBI Special Agent Elvis Chan said publicly that the documents Chan sent to Roth on the evening of Oct 13 did not relate to the Hunter Biden laptop. https://t.co/YMDpb5pLAm
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth says, “The company made a decision that it did violate company policy. It wasn’t my personal judgment at the time that it did. But the decision was communicated to me by my direct supervisor, and ultimately I didn’t disagree with it enough to object to it.” pic.twitter.com/gCYMpHSTAA
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth has confirmed for the first time that he was overruled by his boss, Del Harvey, in censoring the laptop.
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is still clinging to the original narrative:
Rep. @AOC calls the Hunter Biden laptop “disinformation,” which is bizarre. No serious person today denies that the Hunter Biden laptop is real. Multiple news media companies have confirmed that it is real and wasn’t tampered with.https://t.co/yeeygjJn3i
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
What a shocker.
Rep. Fry asks Roth about FBI constantly emailing Twitter about foreign interference.
Roth calls the FBI reports “a bit of mixed bag”https://t.co/hQfxAgDIch
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Roth says he wouldn’t describe FBI as pressuring Twitter, but on Jan 2, 2020 a Twitter exec complained of “sustained (If uncoordinated) effort by the IC [intelligence community] to push us to share more info & change our API policies.”https://t.co/SyVFtTtpLI
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
And that same month, Roth resisted FBI efforts to get Twitter to share data outside of the normal search warrant process.https://t.co/BROSj5l09g
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Rep. Dan Goldman claims the first paragraph in the Oct 14 NY Post was “completely false” bc the Ukrainian prosecutor was corrupt, but the NY Post didn’t claim he wasn’t corrupt, only that Biden pressured the government to fire him.
Not clear what Goldman’s talking about pic.twitter.com/Gcn4v1GYE3
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
A committee member asks Gadde, “How is visibility filtering any different from shadow banning?”
Gadde: “I believe there are different definitions of shadowbanning… At that time I specifically defined shadow banning to mean something different than visibility filtering.”
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
But, as @bariweiss reported last December, “What many people call ‘shadow banning,’ Twitter executives and employees call ‘Visibility Filtering’ or ‘VF.’ Multiple high-level sources confirmed its meaning.”
Gadde misrepresented what Twitter was doing.https://t.co/XyOfa4TQNG
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
It was also confirmed that while Twitter was running interference on behalf of the Bidens, the Ayatollah’s account remained untouched:
Roth confirms to Rep. @RepTimBurchett that Twitter neither de-platformed Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei nor removed his Tweet calling Israel “a malignant cancerous tumor… that has to be removed and eradicated”https://t.co/rWhJ9EsWip pic.twitter.com/8jCXkJ1lOv
— Michael Shellenberger (@ShellenbergerMD) February 8, 2023
Check Shellenberger’s Twitter feed as the thread continues.
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Related:
AOC uses House hearing on Hunter Biden story to promote ‘stochastic terrorism’ against @LibsofTikTok
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