Twitter CEO Elon Musk released a batch of the so-called “Twitter Files” Friday through reporters Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi.
Despite salacious allegations about the giant tech platform, the news received minimal or no coverage on left-leaning major news outlets.
The recent files reveal internal communications between Twitter’s former Head of Trust and Safety, Yoel Roth, and the FBI, DHS and DNI as far back as 2020. Twitter also used a “vast array of tools” to limit former President Donald Trump’s impact on the platform prior to the decision to ban him after Jan. 6, according to the documents.
CNN has not covered the recently released batch of files, with a search across their website proving to be unfruitful. The Daily Caller also searched through their programs airing between Friday night and Monday morning using key words such as “New York Post,” “Twitter,” “Twitter Files,” “Hunter Biden,” “laptop,” “Matt Taibbi,” “Elon Musk,” and “Bari Weiss.”
CNN’s broadcast shows did include two mentions, albeit to criticize Republicans and Musk rather than reporting on the files themselves.
“All I’ve heard from Republican voters in the last few days is the following: Twitter did rig the 2020 election,” former Republican Rep. Joe Walsh said Friday on CNN Tonight. “Trump’s going to use that.”
Walsh then talked about the Trump Organization and did not mention the “Twitter Files” again.
On “The Lead With Jake Tapper,” the guest host mentioned shadow banning and the “Twitter Files.”
“This comes in the wake of Elon Musk’s so-called ‘Twitter Files’ and concerns from some conservatives that they were shadow banned in the past.”
CNN’s tech reporter then explained what shadow banning is and noted CNN has not “independently verified” the “Twitter Files” and did not provide further detail into the contents of the files.
CNN did briefly cover the first batch of files, painting the story as Twitter employees who were grappling with “fears that [the laptop] could have been the result of a Russian hacking operation.”
MSNBC had slightly more “coverage,” with “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough ripping Republicans for “of course” talking about the laptop. (RELATED: Joe Concha Says Corporate Media Has Ignored The ‘Twitter Files’ Story)
“They’re in the middle of this Twitter thing that I swear I’ve tried to read through a thousand times and figure out exactly what they’re trying to prove, and if they’re proving anything, what, maybe Twitter made some decisions they didn’t like.”
Scarborough added that the right has an “obsession with Hunter Biden’s laptop.”
On “The Mehdi Hasan Show,” Hasan called the Twitter files junk.
“They all want you to believe their explosive revelations” are as big as Watergate and the Pentagon leaks, Hasan said. “They aren’t.”
Hasan mentioned that the Biden campaign requested Twitter remove nude photos of Hunter Biden, and then said the files don’t prove left-wing bias or a censorship scheme despite Musk confirming the platform imposed search and visibility restrictions on accounts of political candidates and limiting voters’ ability to hear from them during that time.
The Sunday shows, which are broadcast on networks like CNN, ABC and MSNBC, made no mention of the “Twitter Files” either.
The New York Times and Washington Post made no mention of the drop either. NBC did not provide any straight print coverage of the topic, though an opinion piece by columnist Steve Vladeck alleged Musk has a “basic misunderstanding” of free speech and that the “Twitter Files” are actually “dead wrong.”
