Politics

EXCLUSIVE: White House Is ‘Very Much Looking Into’ Executive Action Against Twitter, Campaign Adviser Says

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Anders Hagstrom White House Correspondent
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The White House is “very much looking into” taking executive action against Twitter for censoring the New York Post, Trump Campaign senior adviser Steve Cortez told the Daily Caller on Thursday.

Twitter has banned, since Wednesday, the sharing of New York Post articles alleging former Vice President Joe Biden was aware of and participated in his son Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine and China. Twitter also locked the official account of the Trump campaign as well as White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany’s personal account for sharing aspects of the NYP stories.

Cortez said the Trump administration has people investigating what the Department of Justice and the Department of Commerce could do in response to Twitter’s action.

“The White House is very much looking into that as we speak — what can be done from the executive branch side, what can the DOJ do for example, or Department of Commerce,” Cortez told the Daily Caller.

Cortez said he did not know whether Trump plans to make an executive order. The White House did not immediately respond to a request to confirm that it is looking into potential action. (RELATED: Twitter Reportedly Suspends Trump’s Official Campaign Account Over Video Relating To NY Post’s Hunter Biden Report)

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai announced Thursday his department would issue new guidance “clarifying” Section 230, the law governing social media platforms.

Senate Republicans announced they will vote Tuesday to subpoena Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding his company’s actions.

Republican Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley and Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz are leading the effort, saying Twitter’s actions to suppress allegations of corruption against a candidate for president amount to election interference. Republicans in the House Judiciary Committee have echoed the sentiment.

The first NYP article reports on a copy of an email allegedly showing both Hunter and Joe Biden met with a Burisma representative in 2015, among other things, which would appear to contradict Biden’s earlier assertion that he “had never spoken to [his] son about his overseas business dealings.” (RELATED: Biden Says He Never Discussed Hunter Biden’s Ukraine Deal. Hunter Says He Did)

The email in question allegedly shows a communication from Burisma executive Vadym Pozharsky to Hunter Biden.

“Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent some time together. It’s really an honor and pleasure,” Pozharskyi allegedly wrote to Hunter Biden in the April 2015 email.

The Post published a second article Thursday morning based on other apparent emails from the same source. They allegedly show Hunter negotiating with a Chinese firm regarding payments to him and his father.

The Daily Caller has not independently confirmed the authenticity of the emails.

The emails reportedly come from a laptop dropped off at a computer repair shop in Delaware. The computer’s hard drive allegedly contains lewd images and video of Hunter, as well as the emails. The computer’s owner never returned to pick up the device after dropping it off, according to the NYP. The store owner later made a copy of the hard drive and reported the device to the FBI, which took custody of it, according to the same report.

The store owner then shared the hard drive copy with the lawyer for former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, according to the NYP.