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New York Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shut down complaints about anti-conservative bias on Twitter after a former Twitter executive testified the social media platform got rid of their rule prohibiting racist and anti-immigrant tweets to accommodate former President Donald Trump's racist tweets demanding four Democratic congresswomen of color "go back" to where they came from.
According to Anika Collier Navaroli, who worked on Twitter's content moderation team when Trump issued the tweet in 2019, Twitter included an example of using the phrase "go back to your country" in a list of banned language against immigrants.
Navaroli said following Trump's tweet, her team "made the recommendation that for the first time, we find Donald Trump in violation of Twitter's policies and use the public interest interstitial."
Navaroli said she brought her recommendation to Del Harvey, Twitter's vice president of trust and safety, and confirmed to Ocasio-Cortez Harvey "overrode" her assessment, meaning "the trope, ‘go back where you came from,’ was removed from the content moderation guidance as an example."
You can watch their exchange in the video below.
\u201cAOC: So Twitter changed their own policy after Trump violated it to accommodate his tweets?\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
Ocasio-Cortez, who was one of the four members of the multicultural progressive "Squad" Trump was attacking, was livid to hear Twitter had bent its rules to accommodate Trump and allowed racism to live unaccounted for on the platform.
She asked:
"So Twitter changed their own policy after the president violated it in order to potentially accommodate this tweet?”
After Navaroli replied "Yes," Ocasio-Cortez said:
“So much for bias against the right-wing on Twitter.”
Many have echoed Ocasio-Cortez's criticisms and praised her line of questioning.
\u201c@Acyn @sgwoods The thing about playing the victim is that it doesn't matter whether you actually are the victim or not.\n\nIt's just a performance, and MAGA leadership is not going to stop just cuz it's untrue.\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn I predict that a lot of these show hearings the Insurrection caucus is going to hold---are going to backfire, because members like AOC do their homework and ask the best questions.\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn @AOC always comes prepared. That is why she is feared and vilified.\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn Good lord, @AOC is marvelous. Beautifully done.\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn Once again @AOC you're spot on. You're one of rare few who have the heart & integrity. Please never give up bc you're becoming a thin minority among US politicians. Never sell out either \u270a\ud83d\ude4f\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn Indeed. They did. They bent the rules for Donald until he broke them. Then they build the rules around him....because he was special. AKA bringing in so much money & notoriety to the Twitter ecosystem. https://t.co/zaoI25C6Ni\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
\u201c@Acyn I seriously can't believe this is the kind of stuff we the taxpayers are paying them for. this is ridiculously wasteful with so many other way more important issues they should be tackling.\u201d— Acyn (@Acyn) 1675874069
Conservative complaints about censorship on social media took center stage during the Republican-led House Oversight Committee hearing, which was held to discuss Twitter's handling of a New York Post story about the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop.
Twitter executives said they made a mistake by temporarily blocking the story, which Republicans felt vindicated their claims the platform censored the story to protect Democratic interests and which Ocasio-Cortez referred to as "an abuse of public resources, an abuse of public time."
\u201c"It's just an abuse of public resources, an abuse of public time" -- AOC on this Twitter/Hunter Biden hearing\u201d— Aaron Rupar (@Aaron Rupar) 1675872356
Conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden's business dealings have been a favorite in conservative circles for some time.
The 2020 New York Post investigation published emails suggesting Hunter Biden introduced his father, President Joe Biden, to an executive with Burisma Holdings–a Ukrainian gas firm–in 2015.
The story received criticism for shaky reporting and Twitter's attempts to block the news outlet from sharing the story received criticism from Republicans who accused the tech giant of censoring conservative voices.
In 2018, while still in office, Trump claimed that Twitter is "SHADOW BANNING prominent Republicans" in response to a news story that alleged accounts owned by Republicans were showing up in a general search of the website but not automatically populating when typing their names in the drop-down bar.
Twitter later issued a response, attributing the issue to a platform bug.