White House Demanded Twitter Ban Former NYT Science Reporter Over Tweets Critical of COVID-19 Vaccines
@COVID19Up: Biden administration officials asked Twitter to ban former New York Times science reporter Alex Berenson from the platform over his tweets critical of COVID-19 vaccines, according to internal communications at Twitter obtained by Berenson.
In a Substack post published on Friday (August 12), the journalist shared photos of alleged internal communications between Twitter employees. In one of the messages, an employee recalls an April 2021 meeting between Twitter and the White House, during which he says a Biden official asked “one really tough question about why Alex Berenson hasn’t been kicked off from the platform.”
“How was [White House]?” the first message states.
“Overall, pretty good! [They] had one really tough question about why Alex Berenson hasn’t been kicked off from the platform; otherwise, their questions were pointed but fair – and mercifully we had answers,” the second message replies.
In a second exchange, Berenson is brought up again.
“JW – any high level takeaways from the meeting? Anything we should keep an eye out for?” one message states.
“Thanks for clarifying. And yes, they really wanted to know about Alex Berenson. Andy Slavitt suggested they had seen data viz that had showed he was the epicenter of disinfo that radiated outwards to the persuadable public,” the second message responds.
Slavitt was a senior adviser to Biden’s coronavirus task force at the time, according to The Washington Post.
Meanwhile, Twitter employees were saying that Berenson hadn’t actually broken any rules. Another internal message from an employee stated: “I’ve taken a pretty close look at [Berenson’s] account and I don’t think any of it’s violative.”
Still, Berenson was suspended from Twitter on July 16, 2021. And on August 28, 2021, he was permanently banned.
He later sued Twitter and won. His account was reinstated and Twitter admitted that the tweet for which Berenson was banned “should not have led to my suspension.”
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@COVID1984chat
I’ve seen this several times where they ban or fact check people and people who can afford it have to pay to stay on the “private” platforms. Everyone who can not or refuses to just gets banned or falsely ridiculed by “fact” checkers. But hey it’s just guys who say mean words that aren’t in line with the millions who say mean words on the regimes favor.
@COVID19Up: Biden administration officials asked Twitter to ban former New York Times science reporter Alex Berenson from the platform over his tweets critical of COVID-19 vaccines, according to internal communications at Twitter obtained by Berenson. 
@COVID1984chat
and people vote for her and agree with her because they too don't understand technology.
