Twitter has banned Project Veritas permanently from its service. An account belonging to the conservative group’s founder James O’Keefe was also blocked. The move came after the organization tweeted out a video that revealed the home address of Guy Rosen, Facebook’s VP of Integrity.
The video in question showed people from Project Veritas accosting the Facebook V.P. Twitter said that this was the last straw as Project Veritas had repeatedly violated its policies on sharing other people’s private information without their consent.
The video was made as an “ambush” type interview where the victim is taken by surprise. Ironically, the Veritas people tried to question the man about Facebook’s censorship policy which has affected Project Veritas’ posts on that social network.
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Free speech advocates will surely decry the move. American political conservatives will be sure to say that this was just an excuse to silence the right-wing in America.
O’Keefe stated in an email, “Late last night, Twitter locked Project Veritas’s and my Twitter accounts, claiming we violated Twitter Guidelines by posting a video of our journalists asking questions of Facebook’s Vice President Guy Rosen which Rosen refused to answer.”
“Twitter claimed the video published private information, which is false. Twitter invited Project Veritas to, and we did, appeal that decision with Twitter. In an apparent act of retaliation for daring to question their authority, Twitter responded to our appeal by suspending our account, continuing to tell us that Project Veritas could delete the tweet and have our account reinstated.”
So now Project Veritas must use alternative social media platforms like Telegram to get its message out.
“The tweet in question arose when asking for comment from Facebook’s VP of Integrity about censorship,” Project Veritas said on its Telegram channel. “Project Veritas is appealing this decision, as no privacy was violated.”
In a funny twist the organization posted the following statement about the ban on its Facebook page:
“We have received so many emails, calls, and messages of support today. Thank you all. We will NEVER back down.”