Politics

EXCLUSIVE: Top Oversight Republican Demands Twitter Preserve Communications About Hunter Biden’s Laptop

(Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)

Michael Ginsberg Congressional Correspondent
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The top Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is demanding that Twitter preserve all communications related to its October 2020 decision to ban a New York Post story based on materials from Hunter Biden’s laptop.

The New York Post published a story on Oct. 14, 2020, reporting a meeting between Hunter Biden, a top Burisma Energy executive, and Joe Biden based off of emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop. Twitter locked the New York Post out of its account and refused to reinstate the outlet unless it deleted tweets promoting the story. The social media giant cited its hacked materials policy, despite no proof that the laptop was hacked by any entity.

“This suppression of information on Twitter occurred during a critical time in the vetting process of presidential candidates and may have influenced the electoral process. The American people have a right to know the policies and decision-makers responsible for suppressing certain views and information on Twitter,” Ranking Member James Comer of Kentucky wrote Wednesday to Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal in a letter obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller.

Jack Dorsey, then the head of Twitter, described the ban as a “mistake” during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in November 2020. (RELATED: Twitter Reverses Censorship Of House GOP Committee Webpage, Says It Was Blocked ‘In Error’)

“We recognize it as a mistake that we made, both in terms of the intention of the policy and also the enforcement action of not allowing people to share it publicly or privately,” he testified.

Read the letter here:

Letter to Twitter Re Doc Preservation 4-20-2022 by Michael Ginsberg on Scribd

Comer notes Hunter Biden’s various international business ventures, including his time on Burisma’s board and participation in the sale of a Congolese cobalt mine to a Chinese firm. Hunter and his uncle, James Biden, were paid millions of dollars for their work for CEFC China Energy.

“Media reports indicate Hunter Biden paid various bills for his father, including thousands of dollars for the then-Vice President’s home in Delaware. If true, the sources of Hunter Biden’s income could exercise undue influence on national security and other U.S. policy positions,” he adds in the letter.

He is instructing Twitter to preserve all electronic documents produced since Jan. 1, 2020, related to Hunter Biden’s laptop. Comer also requests that Twitter contact former employees and contractors who may have access to documents related to the laptop as part of the preservation process.

“We know Hunter Biden is a walking ethical and national security nightmare. The President’s son’s laptop is only the tip of the iceberg and even Twitter knows it. Big Tech’s decision-makers and their policies shouldn’t be hiding behind closed doors. The American people have a right to know who is responsible for censoring credible stories and the preservation of Twitter’s decision-making processes will help determine whether Big Tech is attempting to influence our electoral process,” Comer told the Daily Caller.