[Dudelander]

I think you're kind of playing dumb here, but I'll indulge.

Private companies can censor whomever they want, and that has been the case as long as the US has existed. I'd prefer it if Twitter was more consistent about it, but that's just my opinion.

The government never paid Twitter to censor anyone. The FBI paid Twitter 4 million as reimbursement for processing their information requests, and Twitter pushed back against a lot of those requests.

Companies getting paid by the government is absolutely how capitalism works. Lockheed Martin and Boeing get trillions of dollars of government money to build weapons. SpaceX gets paid to launch satellites. Tesla gets paid to make electric cars. Hell Elon wouldn't be the (second) richest man in the world if it wasn't for our tax dollars.

Nobody should be surprised by any of this. It's how our system has worked for over 250 years.