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Newt Gingrich locked out of Twitter for criticizing Biden immigration policy

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Former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Newt Gingrich was locked out of his Twitter account for over a week after he published a tweet that criticized the Biden administration’s approach to the southern border and raised concern over immigrants crossing the border illegally who may be infected with COVID-19.

“If there is a covid surge in Texas the fault will not be Governor [Greg] Abbott’s common sense reforms. The greatest threat of a covid surge comes from Biden’s untested illegal immigrants pouring across the border. We have no way of knowing how many of them are bringing covid with them,” Gingrich tweeted on March 3.

Twitter promptly sent Gingrich a message explaining that his account was locked for “violating rules against hateful conduct.”

In an opinion piece published in The Washington Times, Gingrich defended his tweet saying that he was reacting to a recent story that said federal officials had no way of testing people who are picked up by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol — or forcing them to quarantine.

In order to unlock his account, Gingrich was required to delete his tweet or go through an appeals process. Gingrich assumed he received this message by accident.

“Thinking this must have been an error somehow generated by the company’s algorithm, we sent Twitter a message pointing out that my tweet didn’t “promote violence against, threaten, or harass” anyone. We asked that my account be released,” Gingrich said.

Twitter reiterated to Gingrich that his tweet had broken their rules of conduct.

“I fail to see how drawing attention to the public health dangers of massive illegal immigration during a pandemic can be censored. So, to unlock my account, I deleted the tweet this morning,” Gingrich wrote.

“There was no reason to censor my tweet or lock my account,” Gingrich continued. “Nothing in the flagged tweet “promotes violence against, threatens, or harasses” anyone. It is simply pointing out the fact that those entering the country illegally are not tested for COVID-19 and could be a health risk.”

In an open letter to Twitter officials, Gingrich posed the following questions:

Do the Twitter censors acknowledge that we are in a pandemic?

Do the Twitter censors acknowledge that testing is a key tool in fighting the pandemic?

Do the Twitter censors acknowledge that, unlike people entering the country legally, people who come into the United States illegally are not tested for COVID-19?

Do the Twitter censors acknowledge that, unlike U.S. citizens, people who come into the country illegally are unlikely to voluntarily get tested because they are trying to keep a low profile?

If so, how exactly do they justify censoring discussion of the threat to public health posed by people coming into the U.S. illegally without being tested?

Gingrich noted that the vast majority of those being silenced online are conservatives.

“This entire experience has made it even more clear to me that Twitter is only interested in censoring conservatives,” Gingrich said.

“I hope Twitter will stop its aggressive and biased censorship, and return to the spirit and ideals of free speech which allowed it to prosper in the first place.”

Follow Annaliese Levy on Twitter @AnnalieseLevy

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International

Report: Intelligence Agencies to terminate sensitive words like ‘Jihadist’, ‘radical Islamist’ because ‘hurtful to Muslim-Americans’

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A newsletter distributed by the Biden Administration’s Office of the Director of National Intelligence, suggested that because “words matter,” national security employees must stop using offensive “terminology related to counterterrorism.” Diversity officials distributed the internal magazine to the nation’s intelligence agencies instructing personnel not to use “problematic phrases.”

Foreign Desk News reports “The Dive” newsletter document was first revealed by The Daily Wire, in which the author, whose name was redacted, wrote that to accomplish these new objectives, the federal government must remove “Islam from words and phrases used to discuss terrorism and extremist violence,” because they are allegedly “hurtful to Muslim-Americans.”

The periodical is published by the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Office of the United States intelligence services. Its materials are distributed to the workforces of the CIA, NSA, FBI, DHS, DOJ, and U.S. military, according to Foreign Desk News. Some descriptions that were singled out for censure are ‘jihadist,’ ‘Salafi jihadist,’ ‘Islamic extremist,’ and ‘radical Islamist’ the newsletter wrote.

Foreign Desk News notes that the new regulations only protect the sentiments of the organization’s Muslim associates, as President Biden has in the past used the term ‘Jewish extremist’ to refer to certain Israeli citizens, and ‘Christian extremists’ to describe many of former President Donald Trump’s supporters.

Among other subjects included in the issue were reported to be the thoughts of a male covert operative who enjoys dressing as a woman because he feels that being transgender helps him do his job better.

House Intelligence Committee member, Republican Mike Waltz, described the new policy as “totally insane,” and stated that it “is a return to the same Obama Administration head-in-the-sand approach to Islamic extremism that led to Obama calling ISIS the JV team.”

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