Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr (RFK) sided with Twitter owner Elon Musk on his remarks about the platform having “no actual choice” but to comply with government censorship requests.
Kennedy responded to Musk’s comments that Twitter was forced into fulfilling government censorship requests.
“[Musk] says Twitter has ‘no actual choice’ about government censorship requests,” RFK Jr tweeted on Tuesday. “He is pretty much correct.”
“Private companies can resist, but governments can shut down platforms like Twitter or fine them into oblivion,” Kennedy continued. “Enough!”
“I’m going to put a stop to that, at least in the U.S.,” he vowed.
RFK Jr followed up with another tweet, noting the “United States is supposed to be a champion of freedom in the world.”
“My administration will restore that role,” RFK Jr wrote, adding, “We will end the censorship-industrial complex,” in response to the remarks made by Musk.
Musk responded to Bloomberg columnist Matthey Yglesias’ article accusing Twitter of approving 83 percent of governments’ censorship requests.
Musk said Twitter had no “actual choice” than to comply with government censorship requests.
“You’re such a numbskull,” Musk tweeted. “Please point out where we had an actual choice, and we will reverse it.”
Twitter took down accounts in response to the Turkish government ahead of Turkey’s elections, later vowing to fight the request in court.
Last month, Musk said he was not aware of “what exactly happened” when a documentary about Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was removed from the platform at the request of the Indian government.
Musk said his company would comply with different nations’ social media laws.
Twitter could face legal repercussions if it fails to comply with social media laws in different countries.
“If we have a choice of either our people go to prison, or we comply with the laws, we will comply with the laws…” Musk said in April.
As The Daily Fetched reported on Tuesday, Musk’s refusal to back down from the EU’s demands for state censorship of “free speech” means the platform could be banned across Europe.
As we reported on Sunday, senior EU officials expressed fury after Musk pulled Twitter out of the bloc’s online censorship project.
France’s Digital Minister Jean-Noel Barrot claimed the so-called “disinformation is one of the gravest threats weighing on our democracies,” pointing to Twitter as a harborer of such threats.
READ: Rand Paul Says Elon Musk Will Go Down in History as “Champion for Free Speech”
