Sen. Ted Cruz took Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to task during hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. Cruz called Dorsey out for knowing nothing about voter fraud, yet applying warnings to tweets alleging voter fraud.
"Does voter fraud exist?" Cruz asked.
"I don't know for certain," Dorsey answered."
"Are you an expert in voter fraud?" Cruz asked.
"No, I'm not," Dorsey replied.
"Then why then is Twitter right now putting purported warnings on virtually any statement about voter fraud?" Cruz asked.
"We're simply linking to a broader conversation so that people have more information," Dorsey said.
"No, you're not," Cruz said. "You put up a page that says 'voter fraud of any kind is exceedingly rare in the United States.' That's not linking to a broader conversation that's taking a disputed policy position, and you're a publisher when you're doing that. You're entitled to take a policy position, but you don't get to pretend you're not a publisher and get a special benefit under Section 230 as a result."
"That link is pointing to a broader conversation of tweets from publishers and people all around the country," Dorsey said.
Cruz posed a number of quotes to ask Dorsey if they were problematic, "potentially misleading," and worthy of warning labels by the platform.
Among the statements Cruz brought to Dorsey's attention, asking if they would be removed, were a few from the Carter-Baker Commission on election reform. Dorsey noted, without being aware of the source, that these statements would likely be flagged.
Interesting moment just now at @senjudiciary - @jack said @Twitter would likely flag two statements regarding voter fraud read to him by @SenTedCruz . The statements came from the Carter-Baker Commission on election reform.
— John Roberts (@johnrobertsFox) November 17, 2020
Dorsey also said that Twitter had labeled 300,000 tweets of "potentially misleading information" regarding the election between "October 27 to November 11, or .2 percent of all US election related tweets."
During the 2020 election season, Twitter banned the New York Post's information regarding Joe Biden's alleged relationship to his son's foreign business dealings, slapped labels and warnings on, as Dorsey said, 300,000 tweets, including those sent by the US president and his campaign.
Twitter took the stance that there was little to no voter fraud in the US, thought Dorsey admitted that he doesn't know anything about the prevalence of voter fraud or lack thereof.
Cruz laid out his own evidence regarding voter fraud concerns.
Twitter Test #1: ‘Absentee ballots remain the largest source of potential voter fraud.’https://t.co/WUjVv3n1Aa
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) November 17, 2020
Twitter Test #2: Voter fraud is particularly possible where ‘third party organizations, candidates, and political party activists’ are involved in ‘handling absentee ballots.’https://t.co/WUjVv3n1Aa
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) November 17, 2020
Cruz noted that a woman in Texas was charged with over 100 counts of voter fraud.
Twitter Test #3: Voter fraud does exist. This is just one example.https://t.co/KmyErGbPAN
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) November 17, 2020
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