The Federal Trade Commission’s demand that Twitter reveal the names of journalists who were granted access to company records is being assailed as “an outrageous attack on the First Amendment.”
Matt Taibbi, the previous Rolling Stone journalist, blasted his “former colleagues in mainstream media” for failing to cover what’s being billed as “insane overreach” by FTC Chair Lina Khan.
He wrote that the shortage of media outrage was “particularly infuriating” on condition that not one of the journalists who published the “Twitter Files” had “asked for nor received access to personal user data” whereas “the Files themselves are filled with instances of presidency agencies improperly asking for a similar.”
“Which journalists an organization or its executives talks to is just not remotely the federal government’s business. That is an insane overreach,” in response to Taibbi.
In a Twitter thread, Taibbi referred to mainstream reporters as “spineless, corrupt, amoral f–kwits.”
Creator Michael Shellenberger, who was amongst those given access to Twitter Files, blasted the Biden administration for its “outrageous attack on the First Amendment.”
Taibbi, Shellenberger, Bari Weiss, and other reporters partnered with latest Twitter owner Elon Musk and commenced publishing Twitter Files — internal documents and communications which detailed how the social media giant’s previous management team sought to silence controversial voices and suppress news items equivalent to The Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Supporters of Musk argue that the FTC’s probe smacks of political retribution.
Musk himself took aim on the FTC, calling it a “shameful case of weaponization of a government agency for political purposes and suppression of the reality!”
Defenders of the FTC’s move include journalist and antitrust expert Matt Stoller, who argued “following the law compels this investigation.”
Twitter reached a consent decree with the FTC in 2011, which was expanded in 2022, that required the social media platform to conduct regular security audits and to maintain the agency informed about the way it handles sensitive data.
“The FTC is seeing whether Twitter is violating its consent decree on privacy, which it has since it was lying to customers,” in response to Stoller, who linked to a May 2022 announcement by the FTC that Twitter would pay a $150 million tremendous for violating the consent decree.
But experts told The Post that the consent decree doesn’t supersede the First Amendment.
“Consent decrees generally give the FTC broad latitude to request information from an organization regarding its compliance with the consent decree and the underlying regulations and law,” Aaron Terr, director of public advocacy on the nonpartisan Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, told The Post.
“However the First Amendment still applies, and FTC demands, here or otherwise, can still violate it,” Terr said.
“It could be unconstitutional and very inappropriate if the agency’s requests were motivated not by concerns about Twitter’s compliance with the consent decree but by displeasure with the Twitter Files disclosures or the journalists’ reporting.”
Paul D. Thacker, a journalist and blogger, sarcastically noted that it was “perfectly normal for [a] federal investigative body to demand the names of reporters interacting with an organization.”
Thacker then wondered how the press would react if the shoe were on the opposite foot.
“All the world can be panicking if the President was a Republican, but it is a Democratic administration, so the NY Times will ignore this,” Thacker tweeted.
The House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government issued a report Tuesday titled “The Weaponization of the Federal Trade Commission: An Agency’s Overreach to Harass Elon Musk’s Twitter.”
The subcommittee report accused the FTC of “orchestrating an aggressive campaign to harass Twitter and deluge it with demands about its personnel decisions in each of the corporate’s departments.”
“These demands don’t have any basis within the FTC’s statutory mission and seem like the results of partisan pressure to focus on Twitter and silence Musk,” in response to the subcommittee report.
Taibbi and Shellenberger are scheduled to seem before the subcommittee Thursday.
“Twitter is required [by the consent decree] to reveal who they offer your personal data to without your permission, including journalists,” Douglas Farrar, an FTC spokesperson, told The Post.
Since Musk assumed control of Twitter following his $44 billion acquisition in late October, Khan’s agency has sent 12 letters to Twitter and its attorneys demanding that they hand over internal communications about layoffs.
Musk has gutted the corporate’s workforce, which numbered some 7,500 employees before the mogul took over the corporate this past fall.
Musk’s takeover sparked concerns that the social media giant might fail to abide by a May 2022 settlement with the FTC through which the corporate agreed to enhance its privacy practices.
That settlement preceded the Musk takeover.
The FTC also wants company records and data concerning the launch of the revamped Twitter Blue subscription service, in response to the Wall Street Journal.
Josh Kosman contributed reporting.