Trump threatens shut down social media platforms after Twitter put a disinformation warning on his false tweets
by Tom Porter, Business Insider US
- Trump has threatened to close down social media platforms if they “silence” conservative voices.
- The message comes after twitter for the first time tagged one of the president’s tweets with a fact check warning Tuesday.
- The platform had been under pressure to take action after Trump groundlessly accused MSNBC host Joe Scarborough of being involved in a murder on the platform.
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President Donald Trump threatened to close down social media platforms if they censor conservative voices, after Twitter on Tuesday tagged one of his messages with a fact check warning.
“Republicans feel that Social Media Platforms totally silence conservatives voices. We will strongly regulate, or close them down, before we can ever allow this to happen. We saw what they attempted to do, and failed, in 2016,” tweeted the president.
“We can’t let a more sophisticated version of that happen again. Just like we can’t let large scale Mail-In Ballots take root in our Country. It would be a free for all on cheating, forgery and the theft of Ballots. Whoever cheated the most would win. Likewise, Social Media. Clean up your act, NOW!!!!”
Twitter has been under pressure to take action against Trump after he spent weeks promoting a baseless conspiracy theory alleging that MSNBC host Joe Scarborough was involved in the death of a staffer, Lori Klausutis, while he was serving as a US congressman.
It’s not the first time the platform had been criticised fir allowing the president to spread conspiracies and smears against opponents on the platform, despite its policies against the promotion of disinformation.
Twitter has declined to take action against the president for those messages, but on Tuesday for the first time put a fact check tag on one of Trump’s messages.
In the message the president claimed that “There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent.”