Columns, Free Speech, Media, Politics

From Shadow Bans to Black Lists, Musk Forces a Free-Speech Reckoning for Politicians and Pundits

Twitter LogoBelow is a slightly augmented version of my column in the Hill on the latest release of the Twitter files, confirming long-denied use of shadow banning and other techniques to suppress conservative and dissenting viewpoints.

Here is the column:

“We don’t make exceptions for jokes or satire.” That line from a third tranche of company documents released by Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk, captures the social media giant’s censorship culture. Its humorless, officious tenor is all too common with state censors throughout history. Censorship creates an insatiable appetite for more censorship, where even jokes become intolerable.

Censorship apologists are running out of room for evasion. They first insisted that Twitter was not censoring disfavored views and then said that claims of secret throttling or shadow banning were “conspiracy theories.” They then insisted that there was no evidence of meetings with the FBI or other agencies.

These latest Twitter files shatter all of these past spins. This includes confirmation of “shadow banning” and other suppression techniques despite denials by former CEO Jack Dorsey under oath before Congress and public denials by top corporate executives.

The legal ramifications will become clearer as more information emerges. Yet, a far more significant problem already is confirmed in these files: the existential threat of corporate censors to free speech.

In the new material released late Friday, journalist Matt Taibbi confirmed that Twitter executives met weekly with FBI, Homeland Security and national intelligence officials to discuss “disinformation” they felt should be removed from the site. Those discussions apparently included the Hunter Biden laptop story.

You don’t need a state ministry of information if the media voluntarily maintains official narratives and suppresses dissenting views. And what emerges from these files is the notion of an effective state media in America — an alliance of media, business and political figures who act, not out of government compulsion, but out of personal conviction.

The notion of a privately-run state media is reinforced by the response to these disturbing disclosures — a virtual news blackout, with most major media offering little coverage of the disclosures. Just as Twitter suppressed dissenting or opposing views in a myriad of ways, many in the media are minimizing coverage of this scandal.

To use a favorite term of Twitter executives found in these files, the media “amplifies” certain narratives or views while “deamplifying” stories that contradict those accounts.

Some of these files reflect specific subjects or measures long pushed by powerful politicians to get private companies to do indirectly what they themselves are barred from doing under the First Amendment.

In a Senate hearing where Dorsey apologized for blocking the Hunter Biden laptop story, for example, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) was more concerned about Twitter “backsliding or retrenching” on censorship and warned that Congress would not tolerate any reduction of “robust content modification.” Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) reminded Dorsey that he expected censorship of misinformation on climate change as well as other areas.

Others, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), have called on social media companies to use enlightened algorithms to protect people from their own bad reading choices. As shown in the recent Twitter releases, these algorithms manipulate what someone sees in searches or trending stories.

What these files suggest is an utter license to control political speech on social media platforms. Twitter executives often sound like overlords determining what the public should be allowed to read or say. This is hardly surprising, given the constant stroking by many politicians and pundits who say they are saving democracy by limiting free speech.

In speaking to media figures in April, former President Barack Obama called upon “our better angels” to shape voters’ opinions. Similarly, President Joe Biden has said social media editors are vital to protecting citizens from their own misguided values or assumptions. Without enlightened editors, he asked, “How do people know the truth?”

Such comments show total contempt for the ability of people to make up their own minds on subjects ranging from elections to vaccinations.

Yet social media executives readily embraced their role in framing “the truth.” Former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal pledged to “focus less on thinking about free speech” and more on “who can be heard.” While some of us denounced his anti-free-speech agenda, others rose in defense of Twitter maintaining one of the largest censorship systems in history.

Now, these Twitter files show precisely what it means to manipulate “who can be heard” — a process that went beyond controversial suspensions of users to include a broader, secret effort to suppress disfavored viewpoints. The new documents show Twitter using blacklists and “visibility filters” to interfere with user searches or to shadow-ban individuals and prevent their tweets from trending. The new material also indicates that “visibility filtering” was directed at various Republican campaigns, throttling or reducing candidates’ visibility before the 2020 election.

Most striking in the latest documents is how Twitter censors knowingly discarded even their own policies to hamper then-President Donald Trump in the 2020 election. In one tweet, Trump referenced a mail-in voting problem in Ohio that was found to be true. Nevertheless, Twitter executives were praised for their speed to impose “visibility filters” so the tweet could not be “replied to, shared, or liked,” and the staff received a censorship “attaboy”: “VERY WELL DONE ON SPEED.”

There was even a long debate over whether to censor a joke about mail-in voting by former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Ark.) because Twitter staff insisted they “don’t make exceptions for jokes or satire.” After all, the censors noted, a joke “could still mislead people” — the same logic that appeared to be the basis for suspending conservative satirical site The Babylon Bee. The only reason Huckabee’s joke wasn’t censored was a concern that “we’ve poked enough bears.”

Of course, Twitter long ago exceeded its bear-poking quota with the public.

A record number of users are signing up with Twitter and a recent poll shows a majority of Americans supporting his efforts to restore transparency and free speech on the site.

Thus, Musk seems to be forcing a reckoning that few in Washington relish — and one which the media can’t continue to ignore, given an expected investigation by a Republican-controlled House. Political and media figures will be forced to dispense with any pretense of support for free speech in defending censorship, election manipulation, blacklisting and shadow banning.

Twitter’s former executives were correct about one thing: There is nothing humorous about any of this — if you value free speech.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. Follow him on Twitter @JonathanTurley.

157 thoughts on “From Shadow Bans to Black Lists, Musk Forces a Free-Speech Reckoning for Politicians and Pundits”

  1. Hillary Clinton said the quiet part out loud when she labelled Trump supporters “a basket of deplorables.” It was her husband who turned the party from the working class to corporate interests, and the entire Democratic party fell into lock step. That’s why today we see all the rubbish talk about racism, trans rights and “white supremacy” coming from elites — of all races — and directed at working people (the only ones left in this country who still have values). This culture war is a cover for class war, and unfortunately the elite class owns the media, so its voice gets disproportionately heard.

    2. FWIW, Clinton only put half of Trump’s supporters in the “basket of deplorables.” It’s interesting that Trump supporters always ignore the other half.

      1. Is this “shadowbanning” “expert” from below and yesterday?

        If so, were you that kid in College who always sat in the front row but the Professors just stopped calling on you bc you kept missing the point due to the hubris of your tunnel vision? Serious question. Also, how’d that work out for you?

        1. No, I was pretty quiet in college. Went on to get a Ph.D. in a STEMM field, so it worked out fine, thanks.

          1. You became the Sorcerer’s Apprentice and remained so. Your tendency toward telescopic vision, rather than an expanded vision is why.

            One of my favorite quotes is from Victor Hugo. “Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the grander view?”

            In your case you need to learn which one to use and when.

          2. And so it all makes sense now. TY for sharing your background. The more Doctorates & Masters among us, the more knowledgable viewpoints we can share! The legal world will let you know when a very specific scientific and/or creative expertise is pertinent & helping…or not. – IOW, don’t take it personally; we are trained this way in order to successfully problem solve in this uber discourse-driven field.

  2. When Mazie Hirono said, out loud, words to the effect of ‘the public aren’t bright enough to figure out what’s true an what isn’t so we need to help them.’ I know that’s not close to a direct quote, but it shows the disdain the Democrat Party has for the population of this country.

    1. While true, one can hardly say the Republican Party, especially leadership, is any different. They’re serious about passing amnesty for illegal border runners despite none of their constituency asking for it. It appears the DC cabal is back to business as usual; to hell with what voters want, they’ll do as their K-Street masters tell them.

  3. Honestly, I can’t believe what is happening in our country. I feel like I’m living 1960s and 70s movies like Fahrenheit 451, Logan’s Run, and Soylent Green, but there are moments when it seems more like Salem, MA circa 1692.

  4. When the highest levels of media and the highest levels of law enforcement collude to sway elections, what do you call that?

  5. It’s not just Twitter, there is a constant “Wave of Yellow Shadow Banning” across the Networks > (Internet|Broadcast|News – ‘The 5th Cartel’),
    to support Pro-Democratic Party views.

    The Fifth Estate’s hand has been called, however they are not going to lay-down Their hand and fold.
    Not when there is so much [$] in the Kitty.

    It will be hard to break this Cartel. Musk is a start but We’ll see how long it last.

  6. If Musk supports parody, why has he blocked those who have imitated him on Twitter with a fake blue check account? Free speech for thee but not for me… yada yada

    1. There’s a pretty big difference between “parody” and forgery or identity theft. When democrat darling Jimmy Kimmel puts on blackface and pretends to be Karl Malone, he’s not really trying to fool anyone into thinking he’s Karl Malone.

      1. A Twitter account with the name of Elon Musk is neither forgery nor identity theft. Please tell me how the elements of either would apply.

        Forgery is limited to documents. A tweet is not an electronic document.

        Identity theft is the fraudulent use of another person’s identifying information to make financial purchases, obtaining something valuable or avoiding legal consequences. What exactly was item of value obtained or the legal consequence avoided here?

        Attributing a fake twitter account to either is pure fantasy.

    2. Anonymous shows his stupidity once again with false equivalences. Pretending to be someone else for the purpose of benefiting yourself isn’t “parody.” It’s fraud. Learn the difference before you say something else really stupid.

      1. How is it fraud? Is there’s a requirement that one’s Twitter name is their actual name?

        If so, then there are a lot more people out there named “the real.”

          1. Lack of integrity isn’t a crime/tort. Don’t claim something as “fraud” it is neither fraud in criminal law nor in tort and then deflect by making some moral argument about integrity.

            Parody is imitation with exaggeration for comic effect. Acting like Musk on Twitter with a paid-for blue check is parody. Musk removed any parameters for the blue check.

            Ask Turley and his support for Novak v. City of Parma: https://jonathanturley.org/2022/11/28/no-joke-supreme-court-case-could-take-a-big-bite-out-of-the-first-amendment/

              1. Yes, that is how the legal system works. Just look the word up in the dictionary!

                No need to prove the elements of the crime or civil action!

                And if we don’t use the justice system as the standard, then who gets to decide if something is “deceit” or “trickery”?

                The old Twitter team deemed your favorite laptop as a fraud / Russian “deceit” or “trickery.” If there’s a subjective standard, see how it can be abused?

        2. “Anonymous” is the fraud. He is pretending to be something he is not and by doing so falsely deprives this site of bandwidth that could be much better utilized.

  7. As one new revelation after another comes forth re the Federal Government’s continuing abridgment of the First Amendment Freedom set forth in the US Constitution…..I am more and more drawn to two Sentences in the US Declaration of Independence.

    “Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.”.

    Those words were accurate back then…..and are growing more accurate today than ever in the history of this current government.

    Where does tolerance and duty meet and one takes precedence over the other?

    How do we as the “People” determine what actions and processes must be taken to create the new “Guards” for our future security?

    It seems a contradiction to think the current Government is going to do that against its own interests of holding total control over the People in violation of the entire notion of what founded this Nation.

    The Government is not about to cure the problem…..as IT (the Federal Government) IS the Problem.

  8. The DNC trolls are out in force today. Such willful ignorance or blindness, or bot like activity.
    Freedom of speech should be a free for all. Remember it is called the marketplace of ideas. How can you have any real discussion of anything without free expression. Sure you will get crackpot stuff or even words that make you uncomfortable. Often when you get uncomfortable you start to think. Why an I uncomfortable? That Is a first step to questioning something. Real thought is hard and makes you question beliefs and understandings or to look at something from a point of view that never occurred to you before. When you discover that it can be delightful, surprising or even horrifying. Or you can sit there like a slug and let the TV, google, or Apple feed you pablum all day. I mean if CBS puts it up on the screen it must be true, right?
    Somehow I just don’t think so.
    The must inane thing I saw today was “Musk is a self promoter”. Wow, how deep. Every politician or used car salesman is a self promoter as well as most other people. The real question is are they truthful and good at their job. If you don’t self promote you disappear. I think this observation is valid as far back as when humans first started to associate with each other. The crazy guy was the medicine man or jester, the self promoter who was great at job his became the chief.

  9. “A private entity violates the First Amendment ‘if the government coerces or induces it to take action the government itself would not be permitted to do, such as censor expression of a lawful viewpoint.’ Biden v. Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia Univ., 141 S. Ct. 1220, 1226 (2021) (Thomas, J., concurring).”

    For those who haven’t been paying attention, that quote is contained within the second paragraph of the original Missouri v Biden censorship Complaint, filed May 5, 2022, where expedited discovery related to a Motion for Preliminary Injunction is slowly wrapping up in parallel with the recent and ongoing Twitter revelations that are the subject of this article.

    And at this point, what stands out (to me) isn’t any revelation about censorship, because we’ve known that that has been happening for years, just as we’ve known for years about the FBI and DNC colluding to tamper with our presidential elections — known about it since at least 2017 (some having known about it since well before that). These revelations are really nothing more than a description of the mechanics and Orwellian semantics employed in executing the censorship.

    What’s actually interesting and actually constitutes a revelation is only now being pieced together, which is the extent to which information about censorship was mysteriously omitted from Defendants’ and witnesses’ discovery responses in the Missouri v Biden lawsuit. With the newly-released Twitter records in hand, it will be quite a Christmas puzzle for the interrogators to piece together over the holidays, figuring out what information deponents forgot to mention while answering questions under oath, and what documents they “accidentally” forgot to cough up in responses to requests for production of documents. As I understand it, it’s quite a pile of evidence, and it’s caught the attention of the current Attorney General (soon to be sworn in as senator) for Missouri.

    So while the media hounds are barking loudly about Musk’s splashy revelations the way a mutt chases a squirrel up a tree, the real news is being quietly sorted out far away from where lazy “journalists” dare to tread — in long hours poring over not just the documents that Taibbi and his crew have been reading and revealing, but in comparing those documents to the questions that have been asked and allegedly answered since May in the Missouri v Biden censorship lawsuit, which has the potential to be the most important legal action since the Civil War — maybe since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

    Meanwhile, on a side note, there’s sick amusement to be had in the comment section at the anti-Trump Fox “News” website, where some of the Fox bots have stopped denying that Fox “News” (and the NY Post) regularly shadow-ban or block comments without just cause. Instead of denying the disreputable conduct that is IDENTICAL to what Twitter was doing, defenders of the Fox website now say that Fox doesn’t run the comment section — that it’s some 3rd party company that runs it. LOL LOL LOL — which is what our government has been saying about social media — that the government doesn’t run social media, and that those are “private companies” that are free to censor at will.

    Probably 99% (a figure of speech, not an actual statistic) of the “free speech advocates” that are squawking up a storm about twitter censorship are secretly (or not so secretly) doing the same thing that Twitter did, and for the same reasons. The only thing distinguishing them from Twitter is that they haven’t lied about it — yet — but that’s only because nobody’s asked them about it —yet — and forced them to answer questions about it. So a lot of the noise about what Twitter did is just a deflection — like when Hillary accused Trump of colluding with Russians so that nobody would notice that Hillary, herself, was the one colluding with Russians.

    1. Twitter hasn’t lied about removing comments, deamplifying comments, banning users. They’re quite up-front about it in their Terms of Service, and users agree to those Terms in order to use the platform.

      The word “coerce” means something legally. The government has not legally coerced Twitter into acting. You might want to read this case about it that Twitter won: https://casetext.com/case/ohandley-v-padilla

  10. “Similarly, President Joe Biden has said social media editors are vital to protecting citizens from their own misguided values or assumptions. Without enlightened editors, he asked, “How do people know the truth?””

    Well dimentia Joe, the first thing I would do is take the opposite position of anything that comes out off your mouth hole.

  12. Even on this pretty sophisticated site we have people like Anonymous telling us that there was no shadow banning, even after all of the evidence, and we have partisan hacks like Justice Holmes (CNN-type) saying “what’s the big deal?”.

    Right out of the Clinton playbook it will be; this didn’t happen; if this happened it was not a crime; if it was a crime it is old news; and finally this has already been litigated.

    Well Anonymous and Holmes congratulations, you are now as partisan and criminal as the Clintons.

    1. “Even on this pretty sophisticated site we have people like Anonymous telling us that there was no shadow banning, even after all of the evidence”

      We must remember this when ATS tells us how honest, honorable and self-correcting he is. He has been wrong on almost every major issue. We argue in the present, waiting for all the data to come in. ATS has been incorrect almost always. That is better evidence of him being wrong on a new issue than not conclusive evidence slowly leaking out.

      1. He/she/umbrella got destroyed here yesterday on another Turley Article. Methinks they are a lonely glutton. I hesitate to feed it, but sometimes it’s hard to resist the easy whack-a-mole.

        1. Only this particular mole isn’t learning no matter how much he/she/zi’s being whacked. Best to starve them by not responding than continuous whacking in futility.

    2. Words and phrases have meanings. You can point to an egg and call it an apple, but it’s not an apple.

      “Shadow banning” has a meaning. Twitter doesn’t shadow ban. They DO deamplify / visibility filter. They DO outright ban. And they are quite up front about that in their Terms of Service, which all users agree to.

      LOL that you consider it criminal for me to point out a basic fact that words/phrases have meanings. You prefer the Humpty Dumpty approach.

      “When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’

      ’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’

      ’The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.”

      2. “You prefer . . .”

        Here is what decent, honest people do *not* prefer: Those who. like you, steal a legitimate concept (in this case, language precision), in order to sow confusion and chaos.

        That you prey on the unsuspecting and bank on their conscientiousness, doulbes your intellectual crime.

        (For those who know philosophy: That is Kant’s gimmick.)

  13. One should treat all sourcing of online information with an abundance of caution. Google controls virtually all searches. All competitors combined are less than ten percent of market share. The best place for a criminal to hide a dead body is on page two of a Google search.

    Facebook and Google lease out their data storage centers to intelligence agencies. If one thinks their emails or any online correspondences are private they are naive. Those “free” WhatsApp calls come with a price, loss of privacy.

    Water water everywhere but not a drip to drink. We live in the age of information overload and yet finding the truth of a matter seems more difficult than ever before.

  14. “The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum – even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there’s free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate.” – Noam Chomsky

    1. This is spot on, many don’t want “free speech”, they want central control and conforming behavior. Independent thinking is more important than ever.

      1. Yup, but at the same time we see the World Governance Organization (aka UN) working with the likes of Google to stifle discussion about climate change. What in God’s name are they so afraid of that they would go to such lengths to abridge speech to protect their narrative. Guess I answered my own question.

  15. This is so ridiculous. Musk doesn’t champion free speech. He champions Musk.

    1. Not really. Seems to be more like sacrifice to attack government and campaign censors plus direction now from members of congress- a Federal government entity to censor an honest debate with different opinions. The Federal government has been 100% solidified against difference of opinion. The most egregious being The FBI knew Biden computer was authentic and Fauci I am science!

      1. mrtenez,
        I agree.
        Seems to me Musk is ready and willing to lose money, just to prove how real censorship is/was, and how involved was the government or other party actors.

  16. Since the first amendment states: ‘Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech’; did congressman purposely use other instrumentalities of government to circumvent the letter of the constitution? If so, is it immoral for elected officials to willfully violate the spirit of the constitution?

  17. Facebook has to be doing the same thing. I have around 700 “friends” and often receive many likes for my few submissions. But when I shared your article and one other about this problem, I had one “like” in response to one of them and none to the other. Unless I’ve missed it, I haven’t even seen these shocking revelations covered on the news side of the Wall Street Journal.

  18. The only ones that fear free speech are those who can’t stand up to scrutiny or debate. The totalitarians in our midst that are the enemies of our freedom.

  19. For years all I have ever heard was ” Twitter is a private company”. They are not bound by the 1st Amendment”. If you don’t like their TOS, don’t use the platform”. All True. What changed? As long as you are not specifically calling for violence, who cares what you are posting? The new way for some to suggest a link between words and fomenting violence is a term that has been used liberally. Stochastic. Which basically means if I say I disagree with someone publicly and a violent act is perpetrated on that person,( not by me), I am somehow responsible. That is lunacy.
    Just like ” misinformation”. In my mind that word has ZERO meaning. There are those who don’t do their own research. There are people who are gullible.
    If you are getting your medical advise from Twitter or Facebook as opposed to your own medical professional, you deserve the consequences.
    If you want to post that aliens built the pyramids, SO WHAT?
    If you want to post that Elvis is still alive, SO WHAT?
    If you disagree with those two statements, come up with a counter argument. And please do not the go to argument of limited intelligence. ” What about…..?

    1. “As long as you are not specifically calling for violence, who cares what you are posting?”

      Lots of people. Words can be harmful even when they don’t call for violence. Why do people ever get angry at someone else for what they’ve said? Because words matter. Words can even result in someone dying (e.g., because someone has convinced them not to seek medical treatment for a treatable but potentially deadly malady, or because someone has made them feel so hated and hopeless that they commit suicide, or because they’re convinced of a conspiracy theory and become violent in response and are shot by police). It flies in the face of reality to suggest that words don’t matter.

      1. Anon, I never said that words don’t matter. They can get you angry. We have all been angry at things that have been said. But we all do not act out because of our anger. If someone convinced you not to get medical attention, that is on YOU. Not them. Suicide unlike homicide means you take your own life. That is on YOU. Here is a unique concept. It is called PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. It is not the job of Twitter and certainly not the government to protect you from yourself. I wish no one any harm. But it is not illegal to be stupid. If you are ” triggered” by a ” microaggression ” and need a ” safe space “, GROW UP

        1. “that is on YOU”

          I think it’s also on the speakers who lead the person to harm. You and I have different opinions about this.

          “It is not the job of Twitter and certainly not the government to protect you from yourself.”

          Actually, the government does sometimes protects people from themselves (e.g., people can be psychiatrically hospitalized against their wishes, there are many illegal drugs).

          And I didn’t say that it’s Twitter’s JOB. I said that lots of people CARE what others post, because those posts can do harm. Twitter can moderate comments as it sees fit because they CHOOSE to and it’s a legal CHOICE.

          1. Anon, it is incredibly difficult to get someone declared incompetent.And I highly doubt that having someone react in a negative fashion to a Twitter post would serve as evidence to get someone psychiatrically committed. As far as illegal drug use, that is on YOU. Nobody can force you to use an illegal drug.
            Outside of getting one’s feelings hurt or riled up,what harm does a post on social media cause?
            I initiated my whole comment with saying Twitter has the right to enforce their own TOS.
            It just seems that now, some don’t like the way Musk is running Twitter. Then unlike many like Meathead who promised to leave if Musk bought Twitter, just leave. I chose to divest myself of certain stocks because I disagree with their corporate philosophy. I don’t expect nor do I encourage others to do the same.PERSONAL CHOICE.

  20. Think you hear crickets now from the corporate media. Wait until witnessses start testifying in the Hunter Biden probe. There will be devastating testimony about Joe Biden’s knowledge of and direct paticipation in the grifting scam. None of media behemoths will touch it. Fox, of course, is an exception but they are preaching to the choir.

    1. Dennis, we have already heard from liberal maniacs like David Brock that they are going to attack (viscously) anyone that goes after Hinter Biden. Watch the media and the Dems throttle anyone that testifies against St Hunter and watch how the media totally ignores any hearings on Hunter and Joes obvious criminal activities.

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