Twitter has quit taking action against lies about the 2020 election: CNN report

An open letter to Twitter CEO and board chair from a $TWTR shareholder

Dear Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, chairman of the board Bret Taylor, and members of Twitter’s board of directors:

I am a Twitter shareholder, deeply disturbed that Twitter has decided to quit enforcing its policy against tweeting lies about the 2020 election.

Yesterday, CNN’s Daniel Dale reported that “Twitter quit taking action to try to limit the spread of lies about the 2020 election,” and that ‘since March 2021,’ Twitter has not been enforcing its ‘civic integrity policy’ in relation to lies about the 2020 election.”

The danger posed by allowing Donald Trump to tweet lies about the election (via his spokesperson Liz Harrington), and others who parrot him to curry political favor, is abundantly clear.

The Atlantic Council’s DFRLab concluded in its analysis, “#StopTheSteal: Timeline of Social Media and Extremist Activities Leading to 1/6 Insurrection” that, “Put simply, the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol would likely have not occurred if not for Trump’s explicit and tacit encouragement of the Stop the Steal movement.”

Twitter permanently suspended the account of former president Donald Trump on January 8th, 2021, “due to the risk of further incitement of violence.”

The risk of further incitement of violence is real. Michael Hayden wrote in an analysis for the Southern Poverty Law Center:

“Twitter gave far-right extremists the platform they needed to plan an attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, and the website, if it maintains its current approach, will likely enable politically motivated violence again in the future.”

A DHS spokesperson told Politico last year of its concern about false narratives being spread on social media:

“‘The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is focused on the nexus between violence, and extremist ideologies,’ the spokesperson said. ‘DHS is enhancing its ability to prevent acts of domestic terrorism inspired by disinformation, conspiracy theories, and false narratives spread through social media and other online…