Marjorie Taylor Greene's gleeful return to Twitter has alarms bells sounding
After nearly a year of being banned from Twitter, Elon Musk has reinstated the personal account of Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. MTG is thrilled of course!
Greene's account was banned following repeated warnings after violating the platform's COVID misinformation policies.
Greene seemed thrilled to learn her personal account was open for use once again. The Congresswoman shared the news on her political account on Twitter, which was not banned.
“I’m the only Member of Congress the unelected big tech oligarchs permanently banned. On January 2, 2022, they violated my freedom of speech and ability to campaign & fundraise crying ‘covid misinformation.’ My account is back,” she tweeted. “Go follow @mtgreenee for MTG unfiltered ;)”
On November 22, 2022, in a broadcast from her newly resurrected personal account which lasted over an hour, Greene vowed to spend her time "testing every limit of free speech that I have."
At one point during her broadcast Greene asked, "why does it take a billionaire buying Twitter to restore people's freedom of speech?"
Greene would not abide by Twitter's rules, and on Jan. 2, 2022, Greene's personal account was suspended permanently from Twitter.
The ban came as a result of Twitter's "strike" system, which was run by artificial intelligence to determine if a post regarding COVID-19 was misleading and could cause harm.
After two or three strikes, a user had their Twitter account locked for 12 hours. Four strikes result in a weeklong suspension from the platform, and users that have five or more strikes could be removed from Twitter permanently.
Elon Musk, now the new owner of Twitter, had expressed his belief that Twitter was too restrictive in the past.
Since taking over Twitter, Musk has reinstated MTG's personal Twitter account and also invited Donald Trump to return.
Elon Musk also gave Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, permission to use his Twitter account once again. Ye's account was suspended for making antisemitic comments.
Musk's decision to reinstate these banned accounts has sounded the alarm bells for civil rights leaders and advocacy groups, particularly in the case of Donald Trump.
The Hill reported that the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, Jonathan Greenblatt, shared a tweet commenting on Musk's decisions over the last month. Greenblatt said Musk's choices have been "erratic and alarming."
Greenblatt also wrote that the decision to reinstate Trump is "dangerous and a threat to American democracy." The activist even went so far as to write, "We need to ask — is it time for Twitter to go?"
Musk had previously said he would not restore banned accounts or make decisions about content on Twitter until a "content moderation council" was set up.
As of yet, neither Elon Musk nor Twitter has acknowledged that such a council exists.