Twitter James Baker suggested censoring Trump COVID tweet
James Baker, the former top FBI lawyer who left to grow to be Twitter’s deputy common counsel, was shot down by the company’s then-watchdog Yoel Roth when Baker proposed an exhortation from then-President Donald Trump urging Americans not to allow COVID-19 “dominate” their lives should be censored.
As Trump, now 76, prepared to leave Walter Reed Countrywide Navy Medical Middle in Bethesda, Md. on Oct. 5, 2020, after undergoing 3 days of treatment for the virus, he tweeted to his 86 million followers: “I will be leaving the wonderful Walter Reed Health care Middle nowadays at 6:30 P.M. Sensation actually good!
“Don’t be worried of Covid. Do not enable it dominate your life. We have formulated, beneath the Trump Administration, some seriously good medication & know-how. I really feel far better than I did 20 years in the past!” the 45th president included.
That afternoon, Baker dashed off an e mail to Roth and one more senior Twitter lawful executive, Stacia Cardille, inquiring them: “Why is not this POTUS tweet a violation of our COVID-19 plan (specifically the ‘Don’t be afraid of COVID’ statement)?”
Roth stated that the tweet was “a wide, optimistic statement” that “doesn’t incite men and women to do some thing harmful, nor does it endorse towards using precautions or adhering to mask directives (or other suggestions). It doesn’t slide inside the published scope of our insurance policies. Curious no matter whether you have a diverse go through on it, even though.”
Baker’s response, if he had one particular, was not mentioned in Monday’s report on Twitter’s internal processes by independent reporter David Zweig.
Though Baker misplaced that inner debate, a former data dump instructed Baker experienced colluded with his previous FBI colleagues to mislead Twitter executives into believing the contents of The Post’s October 2020 Hunter Biden laptop computer exposé ended up the end result of Russian election interference.
In fact, the contents of the notebook had been given to the FBI by a Delaware computer restore shop operator, who gave them to previous White House law firm Rudy Giuliani immediately after not hearing back again from the feds. The former mayor then supplied The Write-up with the eyebrow-elevating material, which showed how the quickly-to-be to start with son designed dollars lobbying in Ukraine and China.
Baker was in shut make contact with with FBI officers before and after the Oct. 14, 2020 article was launched, and falsely advised his Twitter colleagues — who had just lately been primed by the feds for a prospective Russian hacking condition — that the contents of the notebook were being likely inauthentic and overseas election interference, in accordance to a report final week by independent journalist Michael Shellenberger.
The report famous that Baker was “one of the most effective men in the U.S. intel neighborhood,” and experienced liked stints at CNN, asset management agency Bridgewater and the liberal Brookings Institute feel tank, in addition to functioning at the FBI and DOJ.
Baker experienced twice been investigated although used by the FBI for leaking information to reporters, according to Shellenberger, and was uncovered to be secretly vetting the inner Twitter documents in advance of they could be reviewed by journalists, as ordered by new CEO Elon Musk.
“He has been anything of a Zelig of FBI controversies relationship back to 2016, from the Steele File to the Alfa-Server mess. He resigned in 2018 right after an investigation into leaks to the press,” wrote Twitter Files journalist Matt Taibbi on Dec. 6.
“The news that Baker was reviewing the ‘Twitter files’ amazed everybody concerned, to say the the very least. New Twitter main Elon Musk acted swiftly to ‘exit’ Baker,” Taibbi continued.
Household Republicans indicated earlier this thirty day period that they would examine Baker’s part in the suppression of the Post report.
