In a move that frequent Trump critic US Rep Adam Kinzinger (R. Ill) called “authoritarian” in a tweet, users of former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social social media platform were suspended for mentioning in their posts the ongoing January 6 hearings. The move’s utter hypocrisy has been rightly blasted, as the site prides itself in being a bastion of “free speech.”
Truth Social, which Trump launched earlier this year, professes to be “free from political discrimination,” but came under scrutiny after several users tweeted that they had been removed from the site after posting content that may have made Trump look bad.
Truth Social used Travis Allen tweeted “My Truth Social account was just permanently suspended for talking about the January 6th Committee hearings. So much for ‘free speech.’ This is censorship!”
Democratic strategist Jack Cocchiarella echoed, saying “I was suspended from Truth Social for posting about the January 6th hearing last night. Donald Trump is scared of free speech.”
Others noted that their accounts were censored and/or deactivated for posting footage of Ivanka Trump’s testimony before the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riots, in which she cast doubt over her dad’s debunked claims of fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
Truth Social has the authority to moderate content to its own liking despite it’s claims of free speech. According to their terms of service, the platform reserves “the right to, in our sole discretion and without notice or liability, deny access to and use of the service (including blocking certain IP addresses), to any person for any reason or for no reason.”
Truth Social also tells its users that it could “terminate your use or participation in the service or delete [your account and] any content or information that you posted at any time, without warning, in our sole discretion.”
