Business Insider journalist brands Elon Musk a ‘hypocrite’ as her Twitter account remains suspended without explanation
Musk reverses suspension of majority of accounts after Twitter poll
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Your support makes all the difference.A Business Insider journalist branded Elon Musk a “hypocrite” in a recent interview after her account remained suspended on Twitter.
Linette Lopez is one of the several journalists whose accounts were withheld by Twitter chief Elon Musk after he accused them of sharing private information about his whereabouts.
He also suspended the Twitter handles of freelance journalist Aaron Rupar, along with Donie O’Sullivan of CNN, Drew Harwell of The Washington Post, and Ryan Mac of The New York Times. All of them covered Mr Musk in the recent months. Micah Flee of The Intercept and political pundit Keith Olbermann were also suspended.
“The people have spoken. Accounts who doxxed my location will have their suspension lifted now,” Mr Musk had tweeted.
However, while the majority of accounts were reinstated after Mr Musk sought a survey in which people voted demanding the revocation of suspension, Ms Lopez’s account remained withheld at the time of filing of this story.
Her account was suspended after she shared court documents on Twitter revealing that Mr Musk had allegedly hacked and doxxed people in the past, she said.
Hitting out at him in an interview with MSNBC last Friday, Ms Lopez said Mr Musk “is guilty of all the things that he is angry at the liberal media for doing and he’s never been any different from that”.
“We’re just all seeing it,” she told the outlet.
“The reason I felt I was suspended is because Elon didn’t want them to see him as a hypocrite (sic).”
“It’s funny that Elon suddenly has a problem with doxxing and harassing people because he has a history of doing that before people were paying such close attention to him," she told NPR.
Meanwhile, several researchers and journalists took to the social media platform to share Ms Lopez work, as they tweeted in her support.
“This is your reminder: journalist Linette Lopez is still suspended,” tweeted Citizen Lab researcher John Scott-Railton. “She was early & tireless in reporting on issues at Musk’s companies.”
“I am sharing Linette Lopez’s work since [Elon Musk] is preventing her from doing so. She’s also an excellent reporter and writer,” tweeted Hunter Walker, a journalist with membership- funded news site, Talking Points Memo.
“Business Insider reporter Linette Lopez was just suspended from Twitter for the mere act of *reporting on Elon Musk,” tweeted Max Burns, founder of advocacy group Third Degrees Strategies.
“No one is even pretending she broke any Twitter rules. This is simply a case of being a good reporter who Musk really dislikes.”
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