Twitter Deputy General Counsel Asked to Exit By Musk The move comes as the social media platform faces scrutiny from regulators
By Paromita Gupta •
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On Wednesday, Elon Musk, the reigning CEO of Twitter, announced that James A Baker, the social media giant's deputy general counsel, was asked to make an exit after his involvement in suppressing important public information came to light.
On December 3, Matt Taibbi, an American journalist and author, released 'The Twitter Files, Part One: How and Why Twitter Blocked the Hunter Biden Laptop Story' through a series of tweets. The Files include internal documents from Twitter and some described its internal consideration about its decision to censor the New York Post's reporting on the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop.
The files revealed a request from the 2020 Biden presidential campaign to the platform to remove indecent and explicit compromising photos and videos of the current president's son. The content was already in violation of Twitter's revenge porn policy and was removed from the platform.
Musk tweeted a link to the journalist's account revealing the Files and captioned it "Here we go!!"
The investigation and coverage of the files was undertaken by Taibbi and Bari Weiss in accordance with Musk.
Two days ago, Taibbi, tweeted an article titled "Six Degrees from James Baker: A Familiar Figure Reemerges With The Release Of The Twitter Files" by Jonathan Turley, an American attorney. However, Musk replied to the tweet on Wednesday and stated that Baker would be exited today for "possible role of suppression of information important to the public dialogue."
In light of concerns about Baker's possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1600237095364096000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 6, 2022
Taibbi post Musk's reply, shared why there was a delay in publishing The Twitter Files and that Baker's involvement played a role. The reason provided was the alleged "Vetting the first batch of "Twitter Files" – without knowledge of new management."
He further revealed that after the initial batch of the files were delivered, things became complicated. Later, Weiss discovered that the person in charge of releasing the files went by the name 'Jim Baker'.
"The news that Baker was reviewing the "Twitter files" surprised everyone involved, to say the least. New Twitter chief Elon Musk acted quickly to "exit" Baker Tuesday," he tweeted.
Baker, a former FBI attorney, played a key role in the bureau's investigation of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential elections.
On being asked about Baker's explanation for reviewing the material before publishing, Musk responded that the former's answer was "…unconvincing."
The public firing comes as Twitter continues to struggle with its decreased manpower and its concerns raised by regulators across the globe citing lack of staff to maintain and moderate hate speech and privacy concerns.
