(ConservativePeak.com)- Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey attempted to minimize backlash against is social media company on Wednesday, admitting that their response was “not great” when the sharing of a story by the New York Post was banned on Twitter.
The story related to newly-revealed emails between Hunter Biden and his business associates in the United States and Ukraine which reveal how he may have attempted to use his connection to his father, then the vice president, to make money.
Twitter immediately banned people from sharing the link on their public profile or even in direct messages, making it extremely difficult to share the report. Then, many users were locked out of their account for sharing the story via other means.
Those who attempted to tweet the original New York Post link were faced with the message, “We can’t complete this request because this link has been identified by Twitter or our partners as being potentially harmful.”
“Visit our Help Center to learn more,” it added.
Those who then clicked on the link were taken to a page that stopped them from reading the article, with a warning claiming the link “may be unsafe.”
The link, however, directed people to the website of the New York Post, which is one of the most popular online news outlets in the country.
Twitter’s response was so extreme that they even locked out White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, deleting a Tweet she made about the story.
Dorsey attempted to control the backlash over the story, sort of apologizing, but not really.
“Our communication around our actions on the @nypost article was not great,” he said. “And blocking URL sharing via tweet or DM with zero context as to why we’re blocking: unacceptable.”
Our communication around our actions on the @nypost article was not great. And blocking URL sharing via tweet or DM with zero context as to why we’re blocking: unacceptable. https://t.co/v55vDVVlgt
— jack (@jack) October 14, 2020
While some took it as a suggestion that Dorsey was not happy with the way that the situation had been handled, the exact words he used suggest that the Twitter CEO only wanted to see his platform provide more information about why they chose to censor a legitimate news outlet and a legitimate news story.
Twitter’s initial reasoning behind their action was that the information published in the story was obtained through hacking, but the report itself explains how the information was legally obtained from a computer that was left in a computer repair shop in Delaware and never picked up.
The response was been widely criticized, including by Republican legislators.
.@Twitter @jack this is not nearly good enough. In fact, it’s a joke. It’s downright insulting. I will ask you – and @Facebook – to give an explanation UNDER OATH to the Senate subcommittee I chair. These are potential violations of election law, and that’s a crime https://t.co/Rylva8UJv9
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 15, 2020
Senator Josh Hawley argued that the actions could even violate election law.
