ICYMI, Trump has fallen out of love with one of his oldest buddies – Twitter. This week, the social media platform added fact-check labels on a series of Trump’s tweets claiming mail-in ballots would result in voter fraud.
A spokesperson for Twitter told The Washington Post that Trump’s tweets “contain potentially misleading information about voting processes and have been labelled to provide additional context around mail-in ballots.”
Not only did Trump chuck a big tanty about the whole thing (on Twitter) but he’s now signed an executive order targeting social media companies to “defend free speech.”
According to CNN, Trump said the move was to “defend free speech from one of the gravest dangers it has faced in American history.”
“A small handful of social media monopolies controls a vast portion of all public and private communications in the United States,” he claimed. “They’ve had unchecked power to censor, restrict, edit, shape, hide, alter, virtually any form of communication between private citizens and large public audiences.”
An executive order is a directive issued by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government. According to the American Bar, “both executive orders and proclamations have the force of law. Executive orders are not legislation: they require no approval from Congress, and Congress cannot simply overturn them.”
CNN reports that legal experts have raised concerns about Trump’s proposal, claiming “it may be unconstitutional because it risks infringing on the First Amendment rights of private companies.”
Speaking of Trump’s antics, hear about his bizarre diet below:
While Twitter remains at the centre of the controversy, the platform is showing no signs of slowing down when it comes to BS-detection. According to the Daily Mail, Twitter has fact-checked two tweets posted by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lijian Zhao that accuse the US of starting the coronavirus pandemic.
Twitter added labels to the tweets that say “get the facts about COVID-19.”
Jack Dorsey, the CEO of Twitter, has reinforced that he is accountable for the actions of Twitter and asked that people “leave our employees out of this.”
“We’ll continue to point out incorrect or disputed information about elections globally. And we will admit to and own any mistakes we make,” he tweeted yesterday.
Even Facebook chief Mark Zuckerbeg has weighed in on the beef, telling Fox News, “I just believe strongly that Facebook should not be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online.”
“I think, in general, private companies, especially these platform companies, shouldn’t be in the position of doing that,” he said.
It sounds like the war of Trump vs. the social media giants has only just begun. Stay tuned for more updates.
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