| HN Mirror

You don't have a 1st amendment right to post on twitter.

If twitter bans me for spamming, do you think I can sue them?

Twitter officers conspired with hostile, rogue actors inside the US government to defraud United States Citizens of their constitutional rights

They abused technology designed to prevent the spread of child pornography to censor information harmful to their preferred political candidate at the behest of government officials.

gavinhoward 1294 days ago

It's not that Twitter stopped people from posting. It's that Twitter did that at the behest of the government. That is a clear violation of the First Amendment.

The government can ask private companies not to publish things, it does that for "national security" all the time. The company can tell them to pound sound - that's been well established. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/05/16/wh... for example. But there's nothing illegal (and most certainly not 30 year prison sentence illegal) about the government saying "hey could you review these tweets please"?

Do we know what they contained? Were they threats? Spam? Copyright infringing? Disagreements about tax policy?

gavinhoward 1294 days ago

It's called "soft power," and the use of "review" in those messages is clearly meaning something more than that. Otherwise, the government would not have suggested anything at all.

newZWhoDis 1293 days ago

> The government can ask

It actually can not.

The dude behind you with a pipe in his hand asks for your car keys in the parking lot.

Is that ok? He just asked is all…

ethanbond 1293 days ago

Yes they can. Well established and not even controversial in legal circles.

NewLogic 1292 days ago

Wait until everyone hears about ITAR restrictions...

It’s clearly illegal, it’s conspiracy to defraud the United States.

United States citizens have explicit rights, and corporate employees colluding with government officials to “voluntarily” nullify those rights are guilty of conspiracy to defraud the United States

The government represents us, a collusion to defeat our rights is conspiracy against us and subject to civil and criminal action

shagie 1294 days ago

> It's that Twitter did that at the behest of the government.

Could you describe the government at the time this action was taken? What relationship did the people asking Twitter to do things with the government? Did the people making the requests have any authority to direct any department of the Federal Government to take any action?

https://www.justice.gov/archives/jm/criminal-resource-manual...

Rogue elements of the FBI colluded with private corporations and elements of the Democratic Party to defraud US citizens of their fundamental rights for the benefit of their preferred political candidate.

They committed conspiracy to defraud the United States, and will in due time be charged as such by the Department of Justice.

State employees who participated are traitors.

dd36 1294 days ago

Now political campaigns are the government?

Would be curious on your take of what DeSantis was trying to do to Disney in FL? 30 years in prison for threatening Disney about its speech?

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ron-desantiss-military...

jessaustin 1290 days ago

DeSantis should be sentenced to Gitmo for the war crimes he committed there.

>>The people involved should be facing 30 year prison sentences.

For what crime, specifically?

Conspiracy to defraud the United States.

That's...not a crime? The Justice Department can't just declare things as illegal and throw people in jails for 30 years.

https://www.justice.gov/archives/jm/criminal-resource-manual...

It is absolutely a crime

> The general conspiracy statute, 18 U.S.C. § 371, creates an offense "[i]f two or more persons conspire either to commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose.

You are misreading that very severely. Even if it was a first amendment violation to ask twitter to review certain tweets.

"The intent required for a conspiracy to defraud the government is that the defendant possessed the intent (a) to defraud, (b) to make false statements or representations to the government or its agencies in order to obtain property of the government, or that the defendant performed acts or made statements that he/she knew to be false, fraudulent or deceitful to a government agency, which disrupted the functions of the agency or of the government."

What false statements/representations were made, by anyone?

In addition, they had to in some way "defraud the United States" which is: "They cheat the government out of money or property; They interfere or obstruct legitimate Government activity; or They make wrongful use of a governmental instrumentality." - None of which apply.

As an employee of the government there is the presumption that you are knowledgeable of your role, and that said role is charged with upholding the founding document of your organization.

For example, a teacher hired at a school cannot argue that they could not be expected to teach.

Much in the same way, a government employee cannot in good faith argue that they cannot be expected to uphold the constitution.

By secretly colluding with private companies (that the government has failed to regulate, I might add) to suppress otherwise constitutionally protected activity government employees are criminally liable

nathanaldensr 1294 days ago

And yet it's treated as just the latest Twitter drama. Reactions like the ones I'm seeing--"Republicans are just obsessed with Hunter's ****!"--are the reason why the "I Support the Current Thing" NPC meme exists.