trump puts twitter in a pickle. it wants to be a place for 'public conversation,' which militates toward a light or even zero touch when it comes to moderating political speech, esp speech by politicians & elected officials.
in principle that's sensible & consistent with the way that freedom of expression law aims especially to promote and protect robust debate on public issues.
but trump today, as on many days, calls that posture into question. he doesn't use this platform as a place to exchange ideas in some democratic public conversation. he uses it to share disinformation & intimidation.
the ballot tweets are evidently an effort to interfere with voting rights in this country. so now twitter, which took down @jairbolsonaro tweets b/c of their inconsistency with public health guidance, has to consider whether an analogous approach should be taken here.
does disinformation that undermines voting rights fall into a similar category as disinfo that harms public health? in the run-up to elections, this is not hypothetical. *trump will use this platform to suppress voting!*
twitter knows this and adopted a good policy on it last year. see help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-p…. still, what will twitter do under this policy when it comes to voter intimidation/suppression/disinformation by trump & his allies?
will voter suppression by trump fall into the 'public interest' exception? blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/c… will twitter de-amplify or impose a notice on voter-disinforming tweets by trump or his surrogates? it would be good to know that in advance.
i genuinely don't envy the hard calls @Policy will have to make, but clarity about what they'll do in the face of voter suppression tactics *especially from trump & other public officials* will be a critical part of election integrity this year.
for some broader principles concerning freedom of expression during elections, see this 👇
