‘This incident is yet another reminder that Twitter is making up the rules as they go along…’
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Twitter censored President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign on Thursday by removing a video tribute to George Floyd and claiming it violated the company’s copyright policy.
The Team Trump account shared the four-minute video, in which the president commemorated the “grave tragedy” that was Floyd’s death.
The video shows peaceful protesters mourning Floyd’s death, and then Trump warns against the “violence and anarchy” that “radical left-wing groups” are trying to stir up in Floyd’s name.
Twitter took the video down, and now Team Trump’s tweet displays a message that says, “This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner.”
We are working toward a more just society, but that means building up, not tearing down.
Joining hands, not hurling fists.
Standing in solidarity, not surrendering to hostility. pic.twitter.com/mp8957czvh
— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) June 3, 2020
The social-media platform did not tell Team Trump who made the complaint or which part of the video ran afoul of the copyright policy, but Andrew Clark, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, said that it is obvious this is just the latest effort by Twitter to silence Trump.
“This incident is yet another reminder that Twitter is making up the rules as they go along,” Clark said, according to The Hill. “Twitter has repeatedly failed to explain why their rules seem to only apply to the Trump campaign but not to others.”
Following a pressure campaign by several left-wing pundits, led by MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, Twitter has become increasingly hostile toward the president.
Last week, it began placing “fact checks” on tweets with which the company disagrees, although in some cases the “corrected” information has been equally or more misleading. It also accused the president, without evidence, of sharing “violent” material.
In response, Trump introduced an executive order that would curb much of the publishing freedom Twitter currently enjoys by reaffirming the regulatory guidelines of the Bill Clinton-era Communications Decency Act.
The measure would limit what types of material online platforms may arbitrarily censor before losing their status as content producers, thereby subjecting them to broader defamation liabilities.
“In a country that has long cherished the freedom of expression, we cannot allow a limited number of online platforms to hand-pick the speech that Americans may access and convey online,” the executive order reads.