'Ranking Member Plaskett, I'm Not A So-Called Journalist': Matt Taibbi Discusses The Twitter Files — Transcript

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1. 0:00minutes
2. 0:03hit that hit that hit Mr Tybee hit that
3. 0:06um
4. 0:08chairman Jordan ranking member Pulaski
5. 0:10members of the select committee thank
6. 0:12you for having me today my name is Matt
7. 0:14tahibi I've been a reporter for 30 years
8. 0:16and the staunch advocate of the First
9. 0:19Amendment much of that time was spent at
10. 0:21Rolling Stone magazine ranking member
11. 0:23Plaskett I'm not a so-called journalist
12. 0:26I've won the national magazine award the
13. 0:29I have stone award for independent
14. 0:30journalism and I've written 10 books
15. 0:33including four New York Times New York
16. 0:35Times bestsellers
17. 0:37I'm now the editor of the online
18. 0:39magazine racket on the independent
19. 0:40platform sub stack I'm here today
20. 0:43because of a series of events that began
21. 0:45late last year when I received a note
22. 0:47from a source online it read are you
23. 0:49interested in doing a deep dive into
24. 0:51what censorship and manipulation was
25. 0:53going on at Twitter
26. 0:55a week later the first of what became
27. 0:57known as the Twitter files reports came
28. 0:59out to say these attracted intense
29. 1:01public interest would be an
30. 1:03understatement my computer looked like a
31. 1:05Vegas slot machine as the just the first
32. 1:08tweet about the blockage of the hunter
33. 1:10Biden laptop story registered 143
34. 1:13million impressions and 30 million
35. 1:15engagements
36. 1:16but it wasn't until a week after the
37. 1:18first report after Michael
38. 1:20schellenberger Barry Weiss and other
39. 1:22researchers joined the search of the
40. 1:24files that we started to grasp the
41. 1:26significance of this story
42. 1:28the original promise of the internet was
43. 1:31that it might democratize the exchange
44. 1:33of information globally
45. 1:35a free internet would overwhelm all
46. 1:37attempts to control information flow its
47. 1:40very existence a threat to
48. 1:42anti-democratic forms of government
49. 1:43everywhere
50. 1:45what we found in the files was a
51. 1:47sweeping effort to reverse that promise
52. 1:50and use machine learning and other tools
53. 1:52to turn the internet into an instrument
54. 1:54of censorship and social control
55. 1:57unfortunately our own government appears
56. 2:00to be playing a lead role
57. 2:02we saw the first handsome Communications
58. 2:04between Twitter Executives before the
59. 2:052020 election
60. 2:07when we read things like Flag by DHS or
61. 2:10please see attached report from FBI for
62. 2:13potential misinformation this would be
63. 2:15attached to an Excel spreadsheet with a
64. 2:18long list of names whose accounts were
65. 2:20often suspended shortly after
66. 2:22again ranking member Plaskett I would
67. 2:25note that the evidence of Twitter
68. 2:26government relationship includes lists
69. 2:28of tens of thousands of names on both
70. 2:30the left and right the people affected
71. 2:32include Trump supporters but also
72. 2:34left-leaning sites like Consortium and
73. 2:37Truth out the leftist South American
74. 2:39channel telesor the yellow vest movement
75. 2:42that in fact is a key point of the
76. 2:44Twitter files that it's neither a left
77. 2:46nor right issue
78. 2:48following the trail of communications
79. 2:50between Twitter and the federal
80. 2:51government across tens of thousands of
81. 2:54emails led to a series of Revelations
82. 2:56Mr chairman we summarized and submitted
83. 2:59them to the committee in the form of a
84. 3:00new Twitter file thread which was also
85. 3:02released to the public this morning
86. 3:05we learned
87. 3:06Twitter Facebook Google and other
88. 3:08companies developed a formal system for
89. 3:11taking in moderation requests from every
90. 3:13corner of government from the FBI the
91. 3:16DHS the HHS DOD the global engagement
92. 3:19Center at State even the CAA for every
93. 3:23government agency scanning Twitter there
94. 3:25were perhaps 20 quasi-private entities
95. 3:28doing the same thing including
96. 3:30Stanford's election Integrity
97. 3:31partnership News Guard the global
98. 3:34disinformation index and many others
99. 3:36many taxpayer-funded a focus of this
100. 3:40fast-growing Network as Mike noted is
101. 3:42making lists of people whose opinions
102. 3:44beliefs associations or sympathies are
103. 3:47deemed misinformation disinformation or
104. 3:50mal information
105. 3:51that last term is just the euphemism for
106. 3:54true but inconvenient
107. 3:56undeniably the making of such lists is a
108. 3:59form of digital McCarthyism
109. 4:01ordinary Americans are not just being
110. 4:03reported to Twitter for de-amplification
111. 4:05or de-platforming but the firms like
112. 4:07PayPal digital advertisers like Xander
113. 4:10and crowdfunding sites like GoFundMe
114. 4:13these companies can and do refuse
115. 4:14service to law-abiding people and and
116. 4:17businesses whose only crime is falling
117. 4:20afoul of a distant faceless
118. 4:22unaccountable algorithmic judge
119. 4:24as someone who grew up a traditional
120. 4:27ACLU liberal this mechanism for
121. 4:30punishment and deprivation without due
122. 4:32process is horrifying
123. 4:36another troubling aspect is the role of
124. 4:38the press which should be the people's
125. 4:40last line of defense in such cases but
126. 4:42instead of investigating these groups
127. 4:44journalists partnered with them if
128. 4:46Twitter declined to remove an account
129. 4:47right away government agencies and ngos
130. 4:50would call reporters for the New York
131. 4:51Times Washington Post and other outlets
132. 4:54who in turn would call Twitter demanding
133. 4:56to know why action had not yet been
134. 4:58taken effectively news media became an
135. 5:01arm of a state-sponsored thought
136. 5:03policing system I'm running out of time
137. 5:05so I'll just sum up and say
138. 5:07um
139. 5:09it's just not possible to instantly
140. 5:11arrive at truth it is it is however
141. 5:13possible becoming uh technologically uh
142. 5:16possible to instantly Define and enforce
143. 5:18a political consensus online which I
144. 5:20believe is what we're looking at this is
145. 5:22a grave threat to people of all
146. 5:24political Persuasions uh the First
147. 5:27Amendment and American population
148. 5:28accustomed to the right to speak is the
149. 5:31best defense left against the censorship
150. 5:33industrial complex if the latter can
151. 5:35knock over our first and most important
152. 5:37constitutional guarantee these groups
153. 5:39will have no serious opponent left
154. 5:41anywhere
155. 5:42if there's anything the Twitter files
156. 5:44show it's that we're in danger of losing
157. 5:46this most precious right without which
158. 5:49all Democratic rights are impossible
159. 5:51thank you for the opportunity to appear
160. 5:53and I'd be happy to answer any questions
161. 5:55from the committee thank you