Twitter announced Friday that it unlocked Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) campaign account after many Republican groups threatened to stop advertising on the social media platform.
Twitter locked McConnell’s campaign account @Team_Mitch Wednesday after the account posted footage of a protester threatening the Senate Majority Leader at his house in Kentucky. The social media company said that the footage featured violent threats, which reportedly violates their social media content policy.Many Republican groups, such as the Republican National Committee (RNC), the Donald Trump campaign, the National Republican Campaign Committee (NRCC), and the National Senate Republican Committee (NRSC) boycotted Twitter, saying that they will no longer purchase ads on the online platform.
We stand with Sen. McConnell & won’t spend another dime with @Twitter until they unfreeze his account. Locked it after he showed video of threats against him.— Brad Parscale (@parscale) August 9, 2019
Twitter is cool with Hamas or Louis Farrakhan, but not Senate Majority Leader.
Terrible bias!https://t.co/AMhQUl1hi1
The Twitter communications team said Friday that they will unlock McConnell’s campaign account, claiming that they have reviewed this case more closely. The social media platform said that the video featuring leftists making violent threats will feature a “sensitive media” tag.
In response to the news, McConnell’s campaign said, “Victory!!!”
McConnell’s campaign added, “Thank you to EVERYONE for helping #FreeMitch.”
“After multiple appeals from affected users and Leader McConnell’s team confirming their intent to highlight the threats for public discussion, we have reviewed this case more closely,” Twitter said.Victory!!!— Team Mitch (@Team_Mitch) August 9, 2019
Thank you to EVERYONE for helping #FreeMitch.
Help us keep winning: https://t.co/u56exRnfKv pic.twitter.com/7Y28QdkrKv
“Going forward, the video will be visible on the service with a sensitive media interstitial and only in cases where the Tweet content does not otherwise violate the Twitter Rules,” Twitter added.
McConnell also sent
out a campaign fundraising email with a statement from Sen. Josh Hawley
(R-MO), one of the Senate’s foremost critics of big tech. “Big Tech
continues to censor conservatives – no matter the cost,” the email read.
RNC Chief of Staff Richard Walters said that this controversy
serves as another instance of Silicon Valley bias against conservatives.
“From unnecessary censorship to suppression of conservative content,
Twitter has shown an incredible amount of bias against Republicans,”
Walters said Thursday.
“Any future ad money we were planning to spend on the site has been
halted until Twitter adequately addresses its biases and assures
conservatives that we are on a level playing field with the rest of the
users on the site,” he added.
Several Twitter users, including U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s campaign account, were temporarily locked out of their accounts for Tweeting a video that violated our abusive behavior policy.— Twitter Comms (@TwitterComms) August 9, 2019
Original Article: They Call It Twitter Cuz It's Ran By Twits