Twitter considered stricter moderation policies after Donald Trump told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”, but the company chose not to act, an employee has told the January 6 committee.
Maryland Democrat Jamie Raskin said that the committee “interviewed a former Twitter employee who explained the effects that Trump had on the Twitter platform”.
“This employee was on the team responsible for platform and content moderation policies on Twitter throughout 2020 and 2021,” he added. “The employee testified that Twitter considered adopting a stricter content moderation policy after President Trump told the Proud Boys to ‘stand back and standby’ from the lectern at the September 29 presidential debate, but Twitter chose not to act.”
The employee’s voice was “obscured to protect their identity”, Mr Raskin said.
“My concern was that the former president, for seemingly the first time, was speaking directly to extremist organisations and giving them directives,” the employee said, adding that people at Twitter were “worried”.
But the employee said that “Twitter relished in the knowledge that they were also the favourite and most used service of the former president and enjoyed having that sort of power”.
“If former President Donald Trump were any other user on Twitter, he would have been permanently suspended a very long time ago,” the employee told the committee.
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