Rick Scott: ‘Twitter’s a platform for dictators and thugs’

Florida’s junior Senator doubled down on his consistent condemnation of a leading social media platform Friday.

During an appearance on the Fox Business Network, Sen. Rick Scott contended that Twitter “has become a platform for dictators and thugs.”

The Senator, who maintains two Twitter accounts of his own that we know of, contrasted what he sees as permissive standards for anti-American despots around the world to a more unforgiving posture to conservatives.

“The Ayatollah can go on Twitter and talk about eliminating all the Jews, you know, getting rid of Israel. [Venezuelan President Nicolas] Maduro can talk about Venezuela, the genocide of Venezuela. And Xi in China can talk about how great the genocide is of the Uyghurs.”

“They’re all fine on Twitter,” Scott said. “But a conservative can’t be on there.”

“If you’re going to be in that position, be a publisher and pick, I don’t know how you’re going to keep your Section 230 exemption,” Scott predicted.

The Senator has been piqued at the social media company for the better part of the last year, but his irritation really accelerated with Twitter’s erasure of the President’s social media presence last week.

“Twitter has now permanently banned President Trump’s account. Meanwhile they allow the Chinese to openly brag about genocide and the Ayatollah to talk about wiping Israel off the face of the map. How can they defend this? Their attacks on conservatives are shameful,” Scott contended, via the @ScottForFlorida account.

The Senator took a second bite at the apple with his second Twitter account, @SenRickScott, where he said “Maduro commits genocide, but is allowed to use Twitter to spread propaganda with no repercussion.”

This has been an ongoing storyline, one accelerated during recent challenges for the President and the country itself

Last Spring, when the President was under fire for his infamous “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” tweet in the wake of protests over the murder of George Floyd, Scott suggested then also that Twitter’s tagging of the Tweet ran counter to Section 230 provisions in the 1996 Communications Decency Act.