The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Friday warned that the suspension of President Donald Trump’s social media accounts wielded “unchecked power” by large tech companies.
Kate Ruane, a senior legislative counsel at the ACLU, said in a statement that Twitter’s decision to suspend Trump from social media sets a precedent for tech companies to silence voices.
The group first took issue with Trump’s usage of social media outlets to question the results of the Nov. 3 election and his allegations of voter fraud.
“We understand the desire to permanently suspend him now, but it should concern everyone when companies like Facebook and Twitter wield the unchecked power to remove people from platforms that have become indispensable for the speech of billions— especially when political realities make those decisions easier,” the ACLU statement read.
Ruane said that transparency is needed from Big Tech companies, noting that activists who don’t have alternative ways to communicate will suffer.
“President Trump can turn his press team or Fox News to communicate with the public, but others … who have been censored by social media companies—will not have that luxury. It is our hope that these companies will apply their rules transparently to everyone,” according to the statement.
Twitter, which suspended Trump’s account on Friday indefinitely suspended the president’s access. Instagram, Twitch, Facebook, and others have done the same.
Other concerns have been expressed about civil liberties after Apple and Google moved to remove social media app Parler—a social media website used primarily by conservatives—from their respective app downloading stores, saying it has not implemented adequate moderation policies.
“Parler has not taken adequate measures to address the proliferation of these threats to people’s safety. We have suspended Parler from the App Store until they resolve these issues,” said Apple in a statement on Saturday.
Amazon told Parler that it was suspending its Amazon Web Services (AWS) because it wasn’t acting quickly enough against violent content.
“We’ve seen a steady increase in this violent content on your website, all of which violates our terms of service,” the letter stated.
But Parler CEO John Matze said in a statement that big tech companies are working to squash a competitor.
“There is the possibility Parler will be unavailable on internet for up to a week as we rebuild from scratch,” he said in a post on Parler. “This was a coordinated attack by the tech giants to kill competition in the market place … You can expect the war on competition and free speech to continue, but don’t count us out.”
The audacity of the Progressively Communist Democrats is utterly stupid yet not unpredictable. … They just STOLE the Presidency and probably think that they can get away with anything now! … Don’t they understand that if they WANT to incite CIVIL WAR their brazen overreactions to some of the protesters unruly behavior and their continued hate of President Trump and now towards Trump followers and Republican legislators is just ridiculous? … They are so afraid of President Trump being able to run for reelection, they ARE GOING TO IMPEACH HIM even after Jackass Joe impersonates being President because by doing so, they CAN “pass” the IMPEACHMENT and thus “legally” keep him from ever running for President again. … You would think that knowing that if they do so they would anger 74+ million Trump supporters who are already livid with the stolen election, the outrageous behavior of BLM and Antifa rioters and the lack of outrage by Democratic leaders and Mainstream Media of such obviously criminal behavior. Their stupidity is magnified almost beyond belief! … China is cheering and probably offering them military help if Civil War happens! … And just think, Jackass Joe will be in charge of our Nuclear weapon arsenal too! … Brace yourself People, America COULD very well become a Third World Country!
Hmmm…is AMAC safe from such censorship? Can google and the others refuse to let us access this website?
This is a serious slap in the face to everything that is great about this country—the right to freely express ourselves in public without fear of being shut down. But these are private companies, and can do almost anything they want. They’ll feel the sting in only one way–by losing customers. So, let’s drop them! Call people directly, write letters, email, visit each other!
ACLU ARE LYERS AMD SUPPORT ANTIFA SOROS AND SATANISTS
how dare you print their words???
ANTI CONSTITUTIONAL LAW UNION, they are at the heart of the corruption of AMERICAN JUSTICE, everything they have ever done has been designed to weaken the constitution and empower lawyers, they are ALL SOCIALISTS and helped to create the situation we find ourselves in.
Maybe conservatives should set up a new website named Twot.
What happened to the first amendment