Thread by @MiekeEoyang

In response to @twitter's actions to fact check the false and harmful statements of Trump, Republicans, instinctively, are trying to distract with whataboutism & China.

This is a red herring.

Chinese gov't statements on Twitter are different. I'll explain.

Yes, the Chinese government spouts propaganda on Twitter about all kinds of things.

Most of their impact is on Chinese-speaking audiences, which is *not* as most of you have noticed, Twitter. Chinese use WeChat or other platforms.

But for Chinese government statements on Twitter, English-speaking audiences know that & discount accordingly. Americans on a bipartisan basis are unlikely to trust Chinese government statements, especially on things that affect Americans.

We are skeptical of the Chinese.

Also, Chinese government statements -- even in English--don't have nearly the reach in American audiences that a President's tweets have. Nor do they land the same way. They are fact-checked and contextualized by English speaking media to the extent they reach anyone at all.

Unlike Chinese government statements, Trump's tweets can reach parts of the American public directly, without context, or through a media bubble designed to be uncritical.

That Presidents reach the American people directly didn't used to be a problem.

In the past, American President's statements were often treated as definitive statements about how things *are*. Because past American Presidents took care to ensure a factual basis for what they said & didn't want to be proven wrong.

But Trump is a dramatic deviation from past Presidents' concern for credibility. He doesn't really care about the truth of his statements. He's made false or misleading statements over 18,000 times.

washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/…

Trump's blatant disregard for the truth can have dangerous consequences for the lives of Americans as a whole. See: defeat of ISIS, hurricane trajectories, pandemic seriousness, PPE availability, drug efficacy.

Trump's false tweets can also have a painful and devastating effect on the lives of individual Americans.

See for example the widower of the @Morning_Joe staffer: nytimes.com/2020/05/26/us/…

And, Trump's false tweets can have a dangerous effect on our trust in our own democracy.

To mitigate this harm, @twitter flagged his tweets about mail-in ballots.

This doesn't address the harm for his other tweets, but it's a start.

Interestingly, Republicans don't dispute Trump's tweets are false, but claim all false statements should be treated the same.

They do not argue Presidents have an obligation to be truthful with the American people.

They don't ask Trump to stop making false statements.

We should ask, why do Republicans, as a party, condone repeated false statements by the President?

Do they not believe that America should be better? That America should strive for truth, and impartial justice? Isn't that an inherent part of the American way?

Doesn't the American President owe the American people more than what we would expect out of a communist Chinese government that suppresses speech and freedom?

Shouldn't an American President be deeply embarrassed that @twitter had to flag their statements as false?

If the President cared about the truth, then @twitter wouldn't have had to do it.