Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) set the record straight during an exchange on the House floor with Olivia Troye, a former adviser to Vice President Mike Pence, who claimed that government-sponsored censorship was a “politically motivated fantasy detached from reality
During a hearing on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, Massie challenged Troye’s argument, pointing to a specific instance in which one of his posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, was flagged by the Stanford Internet Observatory, a government-funded entity. The social media company later censored the post.
Massie asked Troye if one of the conspiracy theories to which she was referring concluded that “government-funded agencies were flagging and trying to censor official congressional accounts on social media.”
“I would have no knowledge of that. I’m not aware of that,” Troye responded.
Massie turned to Michael Shellenberger, one of the individuals involved with the release of the Twitter Files, and referenced a tweet he had posted that was censored. Shellenberger noted that the tweet was one that the “Virality Project at Stanford Internet Observatory had flagged to Twitter for misinformation,” and that it was “censored in some way other way.”
He also noted that the project is funded by the state, at which point Massie asked if Troye believed that it should have been flagged. “Depends on whether you’re spreading inaccurate information,” she answered.