Skip to main content

Trump threatens to shut down social-media platforms after Twitter put a fact-check warning on his false tweets

* President Donald Trump has threatened to close down social-media platforms that "silence" conservative voices. * He made the threat Wednesday, the morning after Twitter tagged some of his tweets with a fact-check warning. * The platform had been under pressure to take action after Trump leveled a groundless conspiracy theory against the MSNBC cohost Joe Scarborough. * Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. President Donald Trump threatened to close down social media platforms if they censor conservative voices, after Twitter on Tuesday tagged some of his messages with a fact check warning.  "Republicans feel that Social Media Platforms totally silence conservatives voices. We will strongly regulate, or close them down, before we can ever allow this to happen. We saw what they attempted to do, and failed, in 2016," tweeted the president. Republicans feel that Social Media Platforms totally silence conservatives voices. We will strongly regulate, or close them down, before we can ever allow this to happen. We saw what they attempted to do, and failed, in 2016. We can’t let a more sophisticated version of that.... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 27, 2020 Twitter has been under pressure to take action against Trump after he spent weeks promoting a baseless conspiracy theory alleging that MSNBC host Joe Scarborough was involved in the death of a staffer, Lori Klausutis, while he was serving as a US congressman.  It's not the first time the platform had been criticised for allowing the president to spread conspiracies and smears against opponents on the platform, despite its policies against the promotion of disinformation.  Twitter has declined to take action against the president for the messages about Scarborough, but on Tuesday for the first time put a fact check tag on one of Trump's tweets. In the message the president claimed that "There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent." Twitter tagged the message with a blue exclamation mark and warning message, linking to articles in the Washington Post, CNN and other outlets that debunk the president's assertion.  Trump doubled down on his voter fraud claims in a follow-up tweet on Wednesday.  "We can't let a more sophisticated version of that happen again. Just like we can't let large scale Mail-In Ballots take root in our Country. It would be a free for all on cheating, forgery and the theft of Ballots. Whoever cheated the most would win. Likewise, Social Media. Clean up your act, NOW!!!!" wrote Trump.  Trump has long accused social media companies of bias towards conservatives. In June 2019 he invited several far-right provocateurs and conspiracy theorists, some of whom had had hate speech removed by social media platforms, to the White House for a social media summit.  He has also credited being able to communicate on Twitter as a key factor in his election to the White House, remarking that it allows him to communicate with voters directly, unfiltered by media organisations he accuses of partisan bias. Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: Pathologists debunk 13 coronavirus myths
https://bit.ly/3gs4UCe

Popular posts from this blog

'What is the X-Ray feature on Amazon Prime Video?': How to find and view bonus material about TV shows and movies

* X-Ray is an exclusive feature on Amazon Prime Video that displays bonus material about a show or movie, similar to the bonus features on a DVD. * X-Ray can show you information about the actors in a scene, the musical soundtrack, trivia, and more. * To activate X-Ray, you generally only need to click or tap within a video that's currently playing.   * Visit Business Insider's Tech Reference library for more stories. Amazon Prime Video's X-Ray feature is, at least for now, not available on any other video streaming service. X-Ray works like the bonus features you find on a DVD or Blu-ray. With just a few clicks or taps, you can get additional information about many of the TV shows and movies on Prime Video. When you activate X-Ray, Prime displays an overlay on top of your show, offering additional information.  Check out the products mentioned in this article: Amazon Prime Video ($8.99 a month at Amazon) Roku (from $49.99 at Roku) There are several kinds of info...

Why an early exec quit unicorn food delivery startup Deliveroo to launch a food business in the middle of a pandemic

* A former Deliveroo exec has launched a market food hall startup in the middle of COVID-19. * Dan Warne was managing director of the unicorn startup until 2019, but has now launched Sessions Market as a community food hall concept to rejuvenate UK towns after the pandemic. * Warne says he hopes to bring his experience from Deliveroo, particularly about customer behavior, to the analogue world of food halls. * The first venue, Shelter Hall on Brighton seafront, launches July 4. * Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. On Saturday, the UK's bars, restaurants, and cinemas will fling their doors open to customers for the first time since a strict lockdown commenced in late March. Given continued public health concerns around the coronavirus pandemic, it might be unwise to open a new food business right now. But Dan Warne, a former high-level executive at British unicorn startup Deliveroo, has launched Sessions Market, a series of community-orientated food hal...

The 11 most important details we already know about the PlayStation 5, Sony's next-generation video game console set to arrive this year

* The PlayStation 5, Sony's next-generation game console that's deep in production, is scheduled to launch during the 2020 holiday season. * As you might expect, the PlayStation 5 is promised to be more powerful than the existing PlayStation 4 — and we've slowly been learning more about the next-gen console's new features since it was first revealed. * So far, Sony has offered a first glimpse at the new console via its new DualSense gamepad, and a tech demo highlighted the technical prowess of the new machine. * Here's everything we know so far about Sony's next-generation PlayStation console. * Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. The PlayStation 5 is almost here. Sony's next-generation PlayStation game console is scheduled to arrive this holiday season, but we already know plenty of details about it right now: how powerful it is, its main features, and we've even gotten a good look at its new gamepad.  Here everything we kno...