U.S. President Donald Trump has recently posted a tweet that violated Twitter guidelines. Meanwhile, he is calling for a regulation of Section 230 that protects social media sites from certain user content.
In recent reports, Twitter has flagged some of Trump’s tweets as misinformation—mail-in ballots to be more specific. Now he blames the social media giant for “stifling” his freedom of speech.
….Twitter is completely stifling FREE SPEECH, and I, as President, will not allow it to happen!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 26, 2020
This barrage of tweets led him to sign an executive order in hunting down on “censorship” by social media sites on May 28.
Trump takes his anger on the Minneapolis mayor
On May 29, Trump lashes out on Twitter once again over a city’s incompetence in handling the George Floyd incident.
However, in a report from USA Today, they were able to capture the tweet calling the protester “thugs,” followed by a contradicting statement that triggered a lot of people in the Twitter universe.
Twitter put a public interest notice on that tweet before deleting it, saying:
“This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules about glorifying violence. However, Twitter has determined that it may be in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain accessible.”
At a news conference, Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey said that he was unaware of Trump’s tweets and asked a reporter to read them to him. He then criticized President Trump’s actions by emphasizing that pointing his fingers at Frey during the time of crisis was his weakness.
As a result of the George Floyd incident, protests against police brutality and racial discrimination have been rampant. To make matters worse, a news crew was arrested in the process.
Minnesota police arrest CNN reporter and camera crew as they report from protests in Minneapolis https://t.co/oZdqBti776 pic.twitter.com/3QbeTjD5ed
— CNN (@CNN) May 29, 2020
Trump: ‘Twitter is doing nothing about all of the lies and propaganda’
Time and again, the POTUS has been using Twitter to voice his opinions and fuel his political agenda.
In addition, Donald Trump continues to slam Twitter, this time putting his frustrations on China, and Investing.com posted an editorial cartoon mocking the president.
“Twitter is doing nothing about all of the lies and propaganda being put out by China or the Radical Left Democrat Party [. . .] Section 230 should be revoked by Congress. Until then, it will be regulated!” Trump says on his tweet.
As per the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Section 230 of the U.S. Communications Decency Act protects “online intermediaries that host or republish speech” (i.e., Twitter) from legal action over content posted by its users.
In other words, Trump is calling for Twitter, as well as other social media websites, to be held legally liable for the “lies and propaganda” being spread on the platform.
— Investing.com (@Investingcom) May 29, 2020
In reaction to the POTUS tweets, the stock price of Twitter went down over 2% as of this writing. With the relations of the U.S. and China hanging in the balance as well as this ongoing Twitter war that Donald Trump is having, the economic consequences could be fatal.
Featured image courtesy of StockSnap/Pixabay