Twitter Reinstates Suspended Accounts of Several Journalists

By the early hours of Saturday, most of the accounts had been reinstated. But the @ElonJet account was still suspended, as was the account of Keith Olbermann, a former MSNBC and ESPN host, and that of Linette Lopez, a Business Insider columnist whose work covering Mr. Musk’s businesses in recent years had included documenting alleged manufacturing issues at Tesla.

The suspensions had alarmed free speech advocates and prompted threats of sanctions from European regulators.

Jodie Ginsberg, president of the Committee to Protect Journalists, said that if the suspensions were a form of retaliation for the journalists’ work, “this would be a serious violation of journalists’ right to report the news without fear of reprisal.”

“News about arbitrary suspension of journalists on Twitter is worrying,” tweeted Vera Jourova, a vice president of the European Commission, adding that the move violated the European Union digital and media freedom legislation. “There are red lines. And sanctions, soon.”

Mr. Musk, who has repeatedly espoused his commitment to free speech, firmly rejected those criticisms, arguing that what he had done was no different than actions taken by Twitter’s previous owners to restrict certain posts about Covid and presidential politics that the platform had deemed misinformation.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/17/business/media/twitter-reinstates-accounts.html