Hillicon Valley — Musk faces backlash over suspensions

Happy Friday, and congrats on making it to the end of the week when everyone around Capitol Hill is trying to get one step closer to funding the government (one “White Lotus” meme at a time).

The bill could include a TikTok ban on government devices, given Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) support. More on that below.

But first, we’ll break down the latest on Twitter’s suspension of certain journalists, as well as how the GOP is using Elon Musk’s “Twitter Files” to preview a hostile tech agenda in the House next year.  

This is Hillicon Valley, detailing all you need to know about tech and cyber news from Capitol Hill to Silicon Valley. Send tips to The Hill’s Rebecca Klar and Ines Kagubare. Subscribe here.

Suspensions draw renewed scrutiny of Twitter

Several prominent journalists that cover Twitter and its new CEO Elon Musk were suspended from the social media platform on Thursday night, leading to scrutiny from Democrats and a threat of sanctions abroad.

Ryan Mac from The New York Times, Drew Harwell from The Washington Post, Donie O’Sullivan from CNN, Micah Lee from The Intercept, Matt Binder from Mashable, independent journalists Aaron Rupar and Tony Webster and political commentator Keith Olbermann all appear to have had their accounts suspended. 

• The suspensions came on the heels of Twitter’s decision to suspend Mastodon’s official account. The social media platform has arisen as a potential alternative Twitter in the wake of Musk’s chaotic takeover of the company.
  
• Several of the suspended journalists had recently covered Musk’s dispute with Jack Sweeney, who ran the Twitter account @ElonJet that tracked the movements of the billionaire’s jet. That account was suspended on Tuesday, despite Musk’s vows not to ban it just weeks before. Sweeney’s personal account was also suspended. 

Backlash: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and other Democrats blasted the Twitter CEO over the suspensions of journalists.

“You’re a public figure. An extremely controversial and powerful one,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a tweet. “I get feeling unsafe, but descending into abuse of power + erratically banning journalists only increases the intensity around you.”

Rep. Lori Trahan (D-Mass.) said on Thursday that Twitter told her team earlier that day they would not “retaliate against independent journalists or researchers who publish criticisms of the platform.”

“Less than 12 hours later, multiple technology reporters have been suspended. What’s the deal, @elonmusk?” Trahan asked.

• A top official for the European Union warned Musk about “red lines” that exist and potential “sanctions” to come following the platform’s suspension of multiple journalists who cover him and Twitter.
  
• Věra Jourová, the vice president for values and transparency on the European Commission, tweeted that the EU’s Digital Services Act requires “respect for media freedom and fundamental rights” and the Media Freedom Act reinforces this.

‘Twitter Files’ fuel GOP rage on Big Tech

House Republicans are rallying around Elon Musk’s “Twitter Files” to fuel their accusations of anti-conservative censorship, previewing the hostile tech agenda the GOP will launch when the party takes control of the chamber in January.  

Republicans set to chair key House committees pledged to call in ex-Twitter staff to testify at hearings and probe the companies’ content moderation decisions highlighted in the four-part “Twitter Files” series. 

Big picture: Conservatives are trying to prop up the information revealed in the four Twitter threads as examples of the partisan imbalance favoring Democrats they’ve long accused Twitter of using, despite the threads largely showing internal debates among employees over high-profile decisions and lacking details of influence from Democrats.  

“They ran an information operation on — misinformation operation — on the country. So, heck yeah, we’re gonna look into this,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, told The Hill.  

Journalist Matt Taibbi, who released the first batch of “Twitter files,” said that while he saw general warnings from the government to Twitter about possible foreign hacks, he saw no evidence of specific government involvement in Twitter’s decision to suppress the New York Post’s story on the Hunter Biden laptop.

But Jordan said that the revelations are enough to warrant more investigation. 

Read more here. 

📱 PELOSI BACKS BANNING TIKTOK ON GOVERNMENT DEVICES

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) supports adding legislation to ban TikTok on government devices to a federal funding bill, a spokesperson confirmed Friday.  

• Support from the Speaker brings the effort, which gained unanimous support in a separate vote in the Senate, closer to being adopted in the omnibus bill next week.
  
• Her support for the effort to keep the Chinese-owned social media app off government devices was first reported by Punchbowl news.  

Before heading to President Biden’s desk for a signature, the provision would have to be adopted in a Senate version of a government funding bill.  

The Senate unanimously voted to approve Sen. Josh Hawley’s (R-Mo.) “No TikTok on Government Devices Act” Wednesday, signaling there would be support in the upper chamber.

The bill would prohibit certain individuals from downloading or using the video-sharing app TikTok on “any device issued by the United States or a government corporation.” 

Read more here.  

🚫 DOZENS OF CHINESE FIRMS ADDED TO EXPORT BLACKLIST

The Biden administration added 36 Chinese firms to its export blacklist on Thursday, doubling down on efforts to block Beijing’s access to advanced military and surveillance technology from the U.S.

Yangtze Memory Technologies, one of China’s largest chip makers, was added to the U.S.’s “Entity List” alongside 34 other Chinese companies and one Chinese subsidiary located in Japan, essentially blocking the firms from receiving U.S. technology.

Alan Estevez, undersecretary of Commerce for industry and security, said in a statement that the additions to the Entity List will severely restrict China’s ability to “leverage artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and other powerful, commercially available technologies for military modernization and human rights abuses.” 

Read more here.

BITS & PIECES

An op-ed to chew on: How Musk may reinvent the internet without even trying 

Notable links from around the web: 

Elon Musk’s Twitter journalist purge has begun (Vox / Shirin Ghaffary) 

Elon Musk, Management Guru? (The New York Times / Kevin Roose)

🎅🏼 Lighter click: The Hill’s Photos of the Week

One more thing: Going, going — gone

Former President Trump’s digital trading cards have sold out less than 24 hours after he first announced they were available.

As of Friday morning, the site selling the non-fungible tokens (NFTs) says they are sold out, and links to purchase the digital cards are no longer available.  

OpenSea Data, which tracks the sales and markets for NFTs, indicated there were 45,000 of the Trump cards initially made available for purchase for $99 each. The Trump digital cards were the top trending item on the site as of Friday morning. 

Read more here.

That’s it for today, thanks for reading. Check out The Hill’s Technology and Cybersecurity pages for the latest news and coverage. We’ll see you next week.