Twitter disabled the ability of users to either click or share a link to the New York Post’s story alleging that Hunter Biden introduced his father to a Burisma executive a year before the former vice president pushed Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor, who was investigating the company.
Users who attempted to tweet out the story, which calls into question Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s claims of ignorance regarding his son’s foreign business deals, were met with a message that read, “We can’t complete this request because this link has been identified by Twitter or our partners as being potentially harmful. Visit our Help Center to learn more.”
Users who clicked on the link were taken to a page that blocked them from reading the article, claiming, “Warning: this link may be unsafe.”
“This is a Big Tech information coup,” NY Post editor Sohrab Ahmari tweeted. “This is digital civil war. I, an editor at The New York Post, one of the nation’s largest papers by circulation, can’t post one of our own stories that details corruption by a major-party presidential candidate, Biden.”
This is a Big Tech information coup. This is digital civil war.
I, an editor at The New York Post, one of the nation’s largest papers by circulation, can’t post one of our own stories that details corruption by a major-party presidential candidate, Biden. pic.twitter.com/BKNQmAG19H
— Sohrab Ahmari (@SohrabAhmari) October 14, 2020
Republican Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri excoriated the tech company for its apparent censorship, which has repeatedly “hidden” tweets from President Donald Trump.
Cruz blasted the company’s move as “insane” and wrote, “TWITTER HAS DISABLED THE LINK to the @nypost story. @jack what the hell??” Cruz tweeted. “I don’t know if the allegations are true—Qs that deserve to be answered. It’s a serious news publication raising evidence of corruption at the highest levels. @twitter shouldn’t act as Biden’s PR team.”
TWITTER HAS DISABLED THE LINK to the @nypost story. @jack what the hell??
I don’t know if the allegations are true—Qs that deserve to be answered.
It’s a serious news publication raising evidence of corruption at the highest levels.@twitter shouldn’t act as Biden’s PR team. https://t.co/1KiKCAJijD
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) October 14, 2020
Hawley echoed Cruz’s alarm in a series of tweets, wondering aloud if Big Tech “wants to buy this election.”
This is amazing. Now @Twitter joins @Facebook in censoring the @nypost reporting on Biden. You almost get the idea #bigtech wants to buy this election https://t.co/XpTPQRmqSd
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 14, 2020
“This is #BigTech control of news & speech, nationwide, in real time – all in an attempt to control an election,” he continued, adding that Big Tech “are the most powerful monopolies in American history.”
This is #BigTech control of news & speech, nationwide, in real time – all in an attempt to control an election https://t.co/zuw759sWtH
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 14, 2020
These are the most powerful monopolies in American history https://t.co/1zlme17sHk
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 14, 2020
“Does the @Facebook @Twitter coordinated censorship constitute an in-kind contribution to the Biden campaign?” he added.
Does the @Facebook @Twitter coordinated censorship constitute an in-kind contribution to the Biden campaign?
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) October 14, 2020
Journalist Yashar Ali tweeted what he claimed was Twitter’s statement justifying their clampdown. They claimed the NY Post story lacked “authoritative reporting on the origins on the materials included in the article” and also claimed it violated their “Hacked Material Policy.”
Twitter offered a similar reply when The Daily Wire reached out for comment.
From Twitter re blocking the NY Post link. https://t.co/k908Xf1ODV pic.twitter.com/sOMS29lTfB
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) October 14, 2020
Twitter’s apparent attempt to limit the reach of a story unflattering to Biden coincided with Facebook’s attempt to do the same.
Facebook is limiting the reach of a story from The New York Post showing that Hunter Biden allegedly introduced his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, to a Ukrainian energy executive a year before the vice president pushed Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor who was then probing the executive’s company.
“While I will intentionally not link to the New York Post, I want be clear that this story is eligible to be fact checked by Facebook’s third-party fact checking partners. In the meantime, we are reducing its distribution on our platform,” Facebook spokesman Andy Stone tweeted on Wednesday hours after the story broke. “This is part of our standard process to reduce the spread of misinformation. We temporarily reduce distribution pending fact-checker review.”
The social media company said that restricting the story’s spread on its platform is part of its standard fact-checking process used on some news article to limit “misinformation.” Such fact-checks may take as long as a week to complete before Facebook decides whether to lift restrictions.