X owner Elon Musk announced he was doing away with part of his platform’s infamous “election integrity” team—sort of.
According to The Information on Sept. 27, the social media platform reportedly ousted five anti-free speech activists from its contentious election integrity team. Musk took to Twitter to react to the reports, confirming that the individuals were “gone.”
Among those affected by the purge was notorious disinformation chief Aaron Rodericks who came under fire last month in mid-August for undermining Musk’s promise to protect free speech.
Responding to a post of the ousting news, Musk seemingly sarcastically replied in a post of his own: “Oh you mean the ‘Election Integrity’ Team that was undermining election integrity? Yeah, they’re gone.” Less than a day later, X CEO Linda Yaccarino chimed in to dispel rumors that the company was completely getting rid of the group, effectively dousing pro-free speech advocates with a bucket of cold water.
Oh you mean the “Election Integrity” Team that was undermining election integrity? Yeah, they’re gone.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 27, 2023
Yaccarino warned that the best of their election integrity — whatever that means — is yet to come. “It’s an issue we take very seriously,” she claimed while speaking at a conference hosted by leftist outlet Vox. “And contrary to the comments that were made, there is a robust and growing team at X that is wrapping their arms around election integrity.”
The election integrity faction at X first came under scrutiny after political commentator Kristen Ruby found that X — under Rodericks’ oversight — sought to hire new disinformation experts, marking what Foundation For Freedom Online executive director Mike Benz described as a “new crop of censorship shills.”
Rodericks’s job listing, which X took down after it was exposed, was very assertive. “Are you passionate about building innovative products that connect people and enable conversations on a global scale?” the listing claimed, before questioning: “Do you want to be part of a dynamic team that influences how the world communicates?” [Emphasis added.]
While it isn’t immediately clear what the revamped election integrity team’s purview would be, Yaccarino detailed what she described as a “new day” on the social media platform. “X is a new company building a foundation based on free expression and freedom of speech,” she added at Vox, while addressing the dystopian censorship environment under the leadership of old regime Head of Trust and Safety Yoel Roth:
“Twitter, at the time, was operating on different sets of rules, as said by [Roth], different philosophies and ideologies that were creeping down the road of censorship. It's a new day at X and I'll leave it at that.”
MRC Free Speech America reached out to X for comment but did not receive a response at the time of the publication of this article.
Conservatives are under attack. Contact your representatives and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on so-called “hate speech” and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.
