 The House Oversight Committee held a hearing with former Twitter executives to determine Twitter's role in the censorship of the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020. And the goal for Republicans here was to suss out whether or not the Biden administration had directed Twitter to take action and censure the story in order to demonstrate that Twitter executives were in cahoots with the Biden administration. And in fact, they were ready to rock our socks off because Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted out, I didn't buy Twitter, but I'm about to own some former Twitter executives. Tune in to the GOP oversight now. Unfortunately for Republicans, that did not happen. They did not own former Twitter executives. In fact, this entire debacle ended up blowing up in their face, royally in part due to a tweet made by Chrissy Teigen in 2019. This tweet in particular, where she called President Donald Trump a quote, pussy ass bitch in response to him attacking her and her husband for not giving him credit for his criminal justice bill. And the reason why that tweet in particular is so important is because that tweet demonstrates that Trump's administration crossed the line that Republicans say should never recross the government should never direct social media to censor a tweet. But in fact, that is exactly what the Trump administration did. Let's watch the part where this came up. My, my, my, what happens when you hold a hearing and you can't prove your point? We heard from the chairman in an opening statement that it's wrong for government to call Twitter and say take down a tweet. Did I hear that correct, Mr. Roth? That was my understanding, yes. Yeah. On September 8th, 2019, at 11, 11 p.m., Donald Trump heckled two celebrities on Twitter, John Legend and his wife Chrissy Teigen, and referred to them as the musician John Legend and his filthy mouthed wife, unquote. Ms. Teigen responded to that email at 12, 17 a.m., and according to notes from a conversation with you, Ms. Navarroles, counsel, your counsel, the White House almost immediately thereafter contacted Twitter to demand the tweet be taken down. Is that accurate? Thank you for the question. In my role, I was not responsible for receiving any sort of request from the government. However, what I was privy to was my supervisors letting us know that we had received something along those lines or something of a request. In that particular instance, I do remember hearing that we had received a request from the White House to make sure that we evaluated this tweet and that they wanted it to come down because it was a derogatory statement directed towards the president. They wanted it to come down. They made that request. To my recollection, yes. I thought that was an inappropriate action by a government official, let alone the White House. But it wasn't Joe Biden about his son's laptop. It was Donald Trump because he didn't like what Chrissy Teigen had to say about him. Is that correct? Yes, that is correct. My, my, my. Yeah. So let me remind you that the goal for Republicans was to prove that Twitter was oftentimes colluding with Democrats to censor conservatives, hence the conservative bias that they oftentimes claim is a thing. But what ended up happening was that they just got evidence that Trump himself was making requests to censor people who were being mean to him. Now, as this meeting took place, Rolling Stone published this article, which reads, Twitter kept entire database of Republican requests to censor posts. Elon Musk's Twitter files focus on Democrats, but former administration officials and Twitter employees say Trump's team and other Republicans routinely demanded posts to be taken down. And the authors go on to explain, former Trump administration officials and Twitter employees tell Rolling Stone that the White House's Teigen tweet demand was hardly an isolated incident. The Trump administration and its allied Republicans in Congress routinely asked Twitter to take down posts they objected to. The exact behavior that their claiming makes President Biden, the Democrats and Twitter complicit in an anti-free speech conspiracy to muzzle conservatives online. The authors continue, the obvious irony here is the sources note that Republican leaders and elected officials have long been committing precisely the kind of government interference that they are now investigating, fundraising off of, and accusing Democrats and the so-called anti-Trump deep state of perpetrating some of the loudest conservative and MAGA voices on Capitol Hill who've been endlessly demanding taxpayer-funded high-profile investigations into big tech bias and collusion where themselves engaged in the behavior they now claim is colluding. Now, the authors of this article state that this whole database of removal requests don't come exclusively from Republicans. That's not the point that they're trying to make. They also come from the offices of powerful Democrats too. But what they say is that this is a common phenomenon. Now, let me just say for the record that I don't think that any government official should be doing more than reporting tweets. If they specifically reach out to Twitter, I think that that crosses a line. I think that that is too far unless there's a direct threat of violence or a death threat or ongoing harassment. I don't think that Democrats or Republicans and their staffers should be trying to get in contact with Twitter to get them to delete tweets. I think that that's wrong. But the question of whether or not Biden himself has done what Trump did, well, the answer is no, as was demonstrated in this moment where Connolly asked these former Twitter officials whether or not Biden engaged in this. You ever think it's appropriate for the President of the United States to direct or otherwise influence a social media company to take down its content? I think it's a very slippery slope. Mr. Roth, Ms. Gaddy, Mr. Baker, any evidence that Joe Biden's ever done that? Certainly none that I'm aware of, no. I don't recall anything like that. I'm sorry, did President Biden did what, sir? Has Joe Biden ever called Twitter to your knowledge or his White House that has passed to take down content or urge you to take down content? I don't know the answer to that question, sir. Well, I'm going to have to conclude at least from three of the four. You don't know. There's no evidence he's ever done that, but there's plenty of evidence Donald Trump tried to do that. And if we're going to have a hearing about the misuse of social media and the intrusion of government in the content on social media, we've got an environment-rich target, but it's not Joe Biden, it's Donald J. Trump. And of course, we don't want to talk about that. He's exactly right. The GOP's hypocrisy was on full display, but we're in an era in politics where they essentially wear that hypocrisy like a badge of honor. So it's not really surprising. It's just that when they're exposed in this public fashion, you would expect them to be a little bit humble or show a little bit more humility, but of course not. Now, it's not just that Trump made censorship requests. This whole conservative bias idea is hogwash, considering Trump was quite literally given favorable treatment, as was discussed by the former Twitter officials who were testifying. At my time at Twitter, the former President Donald Trump's account was the only account that I did not have access to. Okay. So we know that there weren't individual actors running around Twitter, setting off alarms every other day. Is that correct? Not to my knowledge, no. Okay. Yeah. So Trump was given special treatment, treatment that you don't get, treatment that I don't get, but yet they cry about conservative bias. And it's not just that there isn't a conservative bias. Conservatives are given preferential treatment on Twitter. Libs of TikTok. It was just discovered a couple of weeks ago, inadvertently thanks to the Twitter files that they weren't allowed to be banned. I mean, this was just discovered. And yet they're still claiming, nope, there's a conservative bias. It's just so ridiculous. Republicans are frauds. And I think that this hearing here really demonstrated that. But of course, the people who need to see this, Republican voters, they're not going to pay attention and they'll just dismiss it or say, yeah, well, I don't care about this because they're going after the woke mafia or whatever. It's just ridiculous. Now, there's an entire thread on Twitter by Aaron Rupar, who shows you some of these highlights here. But I just want to play a quick clip where Democrats go further in nailing the GOP's balls to the wall here. I'm going to feel like a little bad for the majority. I just feel guilty because you guys have come today to try to prove that the Biden administration in coordination with Twitter is impeaching, impugning free speech. And the problem is, is that Donald Trump, he is just this thing that hangs around your neck. Because at every turn, he undermines whatever credibility you want to have on this subject. I mean, Donald Trump and his administration has been proven, reached out to Twitter to take down tweets that got under his skin, the tough guy, Donald Trump, right? He got called the B word. Let's reach out to Twitter. Let's get the tweet taken down. You guys have no credibility. You have none. Mr. Chairman, I would just use the second to ask unanimous consent to submit for the record an extraordinary article just published called Twitter kept entire database of Republican requests to censor posts published on February 8th. It was just published by Rolling Stone. So for everybody's reading enjoyment, if people think it was biased against conservatives, this would lead us to believe it was definitely biased against liberals and progressives. I understand my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to be victims so very badly. That jab there from Summer Lee was great. So I had to include it there. And as you saw, Jamie Raskin had entered the Rolling Stone article that we just read into the public record. So now everyone can see that there is evidence that there is a database of censorship requests from the Republican Party. And we're not just talking about Republicans clicking report on tweets as you and I do. We're talking about them reaching out to Twitter and saying, hey, these tweets should be taken down because they violate your TOS misinformation, disinformation. Republicans are making these claims. So they're complete hypocrites. But I feel like that is just obvious at this point in time. Now I do want to show a quick clip. This, this is what I'd like to call the lowlights from this hearing. And there's a lot more. But these two individuals that we're going to watch stood out to me just because of the level of grandstanding that we saw. It was embarrassing. And honestly, they should get some sort of award for acting here. But nonetheless, let's watch. And let me just say I'm not angry for myself. I'm not angry because I was silenced. I can reach out to Elon and to his staff and I can see what's happened. And I can sit here today and hold you all in account. I am angry for the millions of Americans who were silenced because of your decisions, because of your actions, because of your collusion with the federal government. They can't reach out to Elon. They can't sit here today and hold you into account. We don't know where the FBI ends and Twitter begins. You ladies and gentlemen, interfered with the United States of America 2020 presidential election knowingly and willingly. That's the bad news is going to get worse because this is the investigation part. Later comes the arrest part. Your attorneys are familiar with that. Mr. Chairman, I'd like to spend five hours with these ladies and gentlemen doing depositions surely yet to come. But for right now, I'll yield the balance of my time to my colleague, Mr. George. Unbelievable, unbelievable. Clay Higgins there just seriously said that these Twitter officials were going to be arrested because their censorship of the Hunter Biden laptop story was tantamount to interference in the 2020 election. Listen, I have stated this before. I think that it was wrong for social media to censor that story. But to suggest that that was tantamount to election interference is genuinely comical. Like, even if that story were not censored, would it have made a difference? I think most people by that time had already made up their mind, right? But for him to make this suggestion and not only say that, but take it a step further and, you know, imply that they're going to be arrested, just so unhinged. And Lauren Boebert, she's so phony. Oh, I don't actually care. I could just reach out to Elon Musk myself, humble brag, if I get censored. But the millions of conservatives, they get censored and will somebody think about that? Like, she should have just brought up the waterworks, but she was going for the whole anger character that she was playing there. Like, they're such phonies, they're such frauds. But regardless of how they act, the fact remains that they got exposed during this hearing. And I think that Democrats, I don't give them much credit for going toe to toe with Republicans when it comes to politics and strategy. But here they played their cards well, and they backed Republicans into a corner, and this hearing did not go well for them. So I think that it's time for us to once and for all put this notion that there's conservative bias on Twitter to rest, right? And if there's any bias on Twitter now, it's very clearly a bias against the left and progressives. But conservatives aren't going to care about that. And also one thing to point out here, I'd be remiss to not talk about the Twitter files and the way in which it was specifically curated for journalists by Elon Musk and individuals like Matt Taibi who chose to uncritically publish what Elon Musk wanted him to. That's not journalism. That's him being a stenographer to power. That right there is propaganda. Because in the event Elon Musk really wanted to get to the bottom of bias on Twitter, you just take all the files and you give them to journalists and you let them choose what they do and don't publish. This is what WikiLeaks did with the Hillary Clinton emails. This is what journalists should accept and nothing less. But when you've got this hot scoop and you want to raise your profile and clout with the right, you do what Matt Taibi did here. But I mean, if the Twitter files were open, then perhaps we'd see that these censorship requests do indeed come from Republicans, right? So we're getting one side of the story and as a result, Elon Musk was essentially allowing this victim narrative for the right, this bias narrative for the right to proliferate when as we now know, it's not just bullshit, but the opposite is true.