Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky pressed a witness to acknowledge that the government influences social media censorship and showed her his own flagged tweet as evidence at a hearing on Thursday.
Massie called out former Vice President Mike Pence’s Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser Olivia Troye for stating government censorship is not real at the hearing on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Massie pushed her on the issue and showed her one of his posts that Twitter took action on after the company received a notice about it from Stanford Internet Observatory.
“You stated in your opening statement that this committee was indulging in fantasy, detached from reality, that members of this committee and their witnesses make grand and vague accusations about government censorship and that we are spreading conspiracy theories about government censorship,” Massie asserted.
Stanford Internet Observatory had flagged his post to Twitter, Massie alleged. He asked “Twitter Files” journalist Michael Shellenberger if the group is government-funded, to which Schellenberger answered affirmatively.
“Would one of those conspiracy theories be that government-funded agencies were flagging and trying to censor official congressional accounts on social media?” Massie asked. “Are you denying that that occurred?”
“I would have no knowledge of that. I am not aware of that happening,” Troye responded.
“Well we’re gonna make you aware of that right now,” Massie retorted.
Massie then showed the flagged tweet, which included the title of a published study from Israel about immunity from getting COVID-19 being superior to immunity from its vaccine.
“Ms. Troye, is there any reason you think that this should have been flagged?” Massie asked.
“Depends on whether you’re spreading inaccurate information,” Troye responded. “You seem to do that often.”
The congressman said the example showed that nobody is safe from censorship.
“Your testimony is false,” Massie declared.
“If they can do this to a member of Congress’s official account, they can do it to anybody,” he added.
“When Troye dishonestly denies government-funded censorship occurs, she provides cover for government organizations that are targeting the free speech rights of Americans,” Massie said in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Troye did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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