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On Tuesday, Twitter CEO Elon Musk announced that attorney Jim Baker had been "exited" from the company following recent revelations that he may have played a role in facilitating censorship on the platform.
Baker had been hired by Twitter as deputy general counsel following a stint at the FBI that ended with him essentially being forced out of the job.
The Twitter files included revelations that "Twitter took extraordinary steps to suppress the [Hunter Biden laptop] story, removing links and posting warnings that it may be 'unsafe.' They even blocked its transmission via direct message, a tool hitherto reserved for extreme cases, e.g. child pornography.
"White House spokeswoman Kaleigh McEnany was locked out of her account for tweeting about the story, prompting a furious letter from Trump campaign staffer Mike Hahn, who seethed: 'At least pretend to care for the next 20 days.
"This led public policy executive Caroline Strom to send out a polite WTF query. Several employees noted that there was tension between the comms/policy teams, who had little/less control over moderation, and the safety/trust teams," journalist Matt Taibbi revealed in a lengthy thread released on Friday.
"Strom’s note returned the answer that the laptop story had been removed for violation of the company’s “hacked materials” policy:
"Although several sources recalled hearing about a 'general; warning from federal law enforcement that summer about possible foreign hacks, there’s no evidence - that I've seen - of any government involvement in the laptop story. In fact, that might have been the problem...
"The decision was made at the highest levels of the company, but without the knowledge of CEO Jack Dorsey, with former head of legal, policy and trust Vijaya Gadde playing a key role.
“'They just freelanced it,' is how one former employee characterized the decision. 'Hacking was the excuse, but within a few hours, pretty much everyone realized that wasn’t going to hold. But no one had the guts to reverse it,'" Taibbi continued.
At one point, the former Vice President of Global Comms at Twitter, Brandon Borrman, asked if a cover-up of the Hunter Biden story could be "truthfully" censored and covered up as part of Twitter's policies. "To which former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker again seems to advise staying the non-course, because 'caution is warranted'," Taibbi explained.
Following the announcement of Baker's firing, Taibbi tweeted that more Twitter files were to be published over the weekend, but that there was a delay.
"We can now tell you part of the reason why. On Tuesday, Twitter Deputy General Counsel (and former FBI General Counsel) Jim Baker was fired. Among the reasons? Vetting the first batch of “Twitter Files” – without knowledge of new management," he said.
"The process for producing the “Twitter Files” involved delivery to two journalists (Bari Weiss and me) via a lawyer close to new management. However, after the initial batch, things became complicated."
"Over the weekend, while we both dealt with obstacles to new searches, it was @BariWeiss who discovered that the person in charge of releasing the files was someone named Jim. When she called to ask “Jim’s” last name, the answer came back: “Jim Baker," Taibbi continued.
Twitter, after the Hunter Biden story had been released prior to the 2020 presidential election, claimed that they believed the data revealed by journalist Emma Jo Morris and the New York Post had been hacked. This was not true. Hacked material is not allowed on the platform Under their terms of service, The New York Post's Twitter account was locked, and many media outlets, from NPR to The New York Times to the Washington Post all issued explainers to readers as to why they refused to cover the story rather than actually cover the story. CBS only just admitted that it was real.
After the presidential election, in which the winning votes went to Joe Biden, it was revealed that nothing about the story was false, hacked, or misinformation, and that the social media platforms, which essentially operate as the American newsstand, had censored information that was essential for the American public. Polls after the election showed that many Americans would likely not have voted for Biden had they known about the contents of the laptop.
Dorsey and Zuckerberg had to go before Congress and apologize to the American people for what they had done, which each of them assumed was in the best interests of the nation, the American elections, and their platforms.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
Baker had been hired by Twitter as deputy general counsel following a stint at the FBI that ended with him essentially being forced out of the job.
"In light of concerns about Baker's possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today," Musk wrote on Twitter.
Musk said that Baker's explanation was "unconvincing" once he was confronted.
The Twitter files included revelations that "Twitter took extraordinary steps to suppress the [Hunter Biden laptop] story, removing links and posting warnings that it may be 'unsafe.' They even blocked its transmission via direct message, a tool hitherto reserved for extreme cases, e.g. child pornography.
"White House spokeswoman Kaleigh McEnany was locked out of her account for tweeting about the story, prompting a furious letter from Trump campaign staffer Mike Hahn, who seethed: 'At least pretend to care for the next 20 days.
"This led public policy executive Caroline Strom to send out a polite WTF query. Several employees noted that there was tension between the comms/policy teams, who had little/less control over moderation, and the safety/trust teams," journalist Matt Taibbi revealed in a lengthy thread released on Friday.
"Strom’s note returned the answer that the laptop story had been removed for violation of the company’s “hacked materials” policy:
"Although several sources recalled hearing about a 'general; warning from federal law enforcement that summer about possible foreign hacks, there’s no evidence - that I've seen - of any government involvement in the laptop story. In fact, that might have been the problem...
"The decision was made at the highest levels of the company, but without the knowledge of CEO Jack Dorsey, with former head of legal, policy and trust Vijaya Gadde playing a key role.
“'They just freelanced it,' is how one former employee characterized the decision. 'Hacking was the excuse, but within a few hours, pretty much everyone realized that wasn’t going to hold. But no one had the guts to reverse it,'" Taibbi continued.
At one point, the former Vice President of Global Comms at Twitter, Brandon Borrman, asked if a cover-up of the Hunter Biden story could be "truthfully" censored and covered up as part of Twitter's policies. "To which former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker again seems to advise staying the non-course, because 'caution is warranted'," Taibbi explained.
Following the announcement of Baker's firing, Taibbi tweeted that more Twitter files were to be published over the weekend, but that there was a delay.
"We can now tell you part of the reason why. On Tuesday, Twitter Deputy General Counsel (and former FBI General Counsel) Jim Baker was fired. Among the reasons? Vetting the first batch of “Twitter Files” – without knowledge of new management," he said.
"The process for producing the “Twitter Files” involved delivery to two journalists (Bari Weiss and me) via a lawyer close to new management. However, after the initial batch, things became complicated."
"Over the weekend, while we both dealt with obstacles to new searches, it was @BariWeiss who discovered that the person in charge of releasing the files was someone named Jim. When she called to ask “Jim’s” last name, the answer came back: “Jim Baker," Taibbi continued.
Twitter, after the Hunter Biden story had been released prior to the 2020 presidential election, claimed that they believed the data revealed by journalist Emma Jo Morris and the New York Post had been hacked. This was not true. Hacked material is not allowed on the platform Under their terms of service, The New York Post's Twitter account was locked, and many media outlets, from NPR to The New York Times to the Washington Post all issued explainers to readers as to why they refused to cover the story rather than actually cover the story. CBS only just admitted that it was real.
After the presidential election, in which the winning votes went to Joe Biden, it was revealed that nothing about the story was false, hacked, or misinformation, and that the social media platforms, which essentially operate as the American newsstand, had censored information that was essential for the American public. Polls after the election showed that many Americans would likely not have voted for Biden had they known about the contents of the laptop.
Dorsey and Zuckerberg had to go before Congress and apologize to the American people for what they had done, which each of them assumed was in the best interests of the nation, the American elections, and their platforms.
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
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