Newest Batch of “Twitter Files” Reveal Biden Admin Pressured Platform to Censor COVID Misinformation

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Twitter’s head of U.S. public policy released a record of meetings with the Biden Admin noting that officials were “very angry” the company had not been more “aggressive” in quieting voices that were questioning COVID vaccines. File photo: Alexandros Michailidis, Shutter Stock, licensed.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The newest batch of so-called “Twitter Files” came out Monday, detailing the Biden Administration’s attempts to pressure the social media platform to censor purported COVID-19-related misinformation and to ban users deemed guilty of spreading it. 

Twitter CEO Elon Musk is currently in the process of releasing a series of documents pertaining to the microblogging website’s clandestine activities prior to his October purchase of it, saying that the public “deserves to know” that they were being repeatedly censored by the tech giant. 

During the height of the pandemic, the Trump Administration is alleged to have begun a pressure campaign on Twitter in order to attempt to control the narrative relating to the virus; the pressure was only ramped up when Joe Biden took office, according to Monday’s document dump, courtesy of Free Press reporter David Zweig. 

An example of this was in June 2021; New York Times reporter and anti-vaxxer Alex Berenson was banned from Twitter just a short time after Biden had issued a public statement that the COVID-19 misinformation running rampant on social media was “killing people.” Berenson subsequently successfully sued Twitter, revealing that pressure from the Biden Admin was indeed the cause of his ban from the site. 

Another prominent critic of the COVID-19 response who was also banned from Twitter after pressure from the White House was Harvard Medical School epidemiologist Dr. Martin Kulldorff, who promoted the idea that those previously infected by the virus had “natural immunity” and did not require to be vaccinated. 

In addition, Twitter’s head of U.S. public policy, Lauren Culbertson, released a record of her meetings with the Biden Admin earlier in December, noting that federal officials were “very angry” that the company had not been more “aggressive” in quieting the voices that were questioning the COVID vaccines. 

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