By Caden Pearson
The House panel investigating the weaponization of the federal government said Tuesday the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has orchestrated âan aggressive campaign to harass Twitterâ as part of its âunusual responseâ to Elon Muskâs acquisition of the social network.
The Committee on the Judiciary and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government released an interim report highlighting the FTCâs apparent overreach in making more than 350 specific demands for information within a period of less than three months after Musk took the helm.
According to the report, the federal agency inundated Twitter with demands to reveal information about hiring and firing decisions and âevery internal communication relating to Elon Musk.â
Particularly concerning for the panel, the FTC wanted the names of journalists who were granted access to internal Twitter files during their work âto expose abuses by Big Tech and the federal government.â
Among others, the FTC sent over 60 letters demanding information about Twitterâs subscription product alone. The agency also demanded to know if Twitter was âselling its office equipmentâ and âall of the reasonsâ why former FBI official Jim Baker was fired.
âThese demands have no basis in the FTCâs statutory mission and appear to be the result of partisan pressure to target Twitter and silence Musk,â the report states (pdf).
The committee said it recently obtained dozens of nonpublic FTC letters to Twitter, which it noted fall directly within its authority to investigate and report âon instances of the federal governmentâs authority being weaponized against U.S. citizens.â
Demands for Journalistsâ Names âInappropriateâ
The House committeeâs report criticizes the FTCâs demand for information about journalists, calling it inappropriate in any setting.
The report emphasizes that the FTCâs âcampaign to harass Twitterâ could have a chilling effect on the ability of journalists to report on matters of public interest and calls for greater protection of First Amendment rights.
After journalist Matt Taibbi published the first installment of the âTwitter Files,â exposing a government-Big Tech censorship machine, the FTC sent its first letter to Twitter.
The panelâs report notes it was telling that the FTCâs first demand âdid not concern what private user information may have been at risk.â
âInstead, the FTC demanded that Twitter â[i]dentify all journalists and other members of the media to whomâ Twitter has granted access to since Musk bought the company.â
The FTC named the journalists involved in the initial disclosures, including Bari Weiss, Matt Taibbi, Michael Shellenberger, and Abigail Shrier.
The agency also demanded to know any âother members of the media to whom You have granted any type of access to the Companyâs internal communications for any reason whatsoever,â according to the report.
âThere is no reason the FTC needs to know every journalist with whom Twitter was engaging. Even more troubling than the burden on the company, the FTCâs demand represents a government inquiry into First Amendment-protected activity,â the report states.
âIt is an agency of the federal government demanding that a private company reveal the names of the journalists who are engaged in reporting about matters of public interest, including potential government misconduct,â the report continues. âWhile the FTCâs inquiry would be inappropriate in any setting, it is especially inappropriate in the context of journalists disclosing how social media companies helped the government to censor online speech.â
Musk responded on Twitter regarding reports about the federal agencyâs request for the names of journalists.
âThis is a serious attack on the Constitution by a federal agency,â Musk said.
âPolitically Motivatedâ Left Wing Pressure
The FTC used its consent decree with Twitter as a pretext to harass the social network and received pressure from left-wing individuals and groups, according to the report. That consent agreement, which was later revised, acts as a safeguard of usersâ personal information.
In 2022, before Muskâs takeover, FTC Chair Lina Khan assured the Judiciary Committee that the agency âacts only in the public interestâ and is âconfinedâ by its statutory authority, the report states.
However, the nonpublic information obtained by the House panel disputes this.
Citing its revised consent agreement, the FTC âbegan its barrage of demandsâ just two weeks after Musk became the CEO in October 2022.
The day it fired off its first letters, the agency said publicly that it was âtracking recent developments at Twitter with deep concernâ and warned that the ârevised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.â
The report notes that the timing of the FTCâs actions âstrongly suggests that its reliance on the consent decree is a pretext.â The report notes that Musk became CEO of Twitter on Oct. 27, 2022, and that the FTC sent its first two letters with over a dozen demands on Nov. 10, 2022.
However, under the terms of the revised consent agreement, which formed the pretext of the FTCâs actions, Twitter was not required to implement its new privacy and information security program until Nov. 22, 2022.
âIn other words, the FTC started this heavy-handed compliance monitoring two weeks after Musk acquired Twitter, but two weeks before there was even a program in place to monitor,â the report states.
The report states that left-wing individuals and groups pressured the federal government to take action, citing their objections to Muskâs stated intentions to make Twitter a bastion of free speech on the internet.
Among the left-wing groups vocal in their objections to Muskâs purchase of Twitter was an organization called Open Markets Institute, where FTC Chair Khan once worked.
This organization, described in the report as a âleft-wing political advocacyâ group, wrote to the FTC specifically urging it to use its consent agreement âas a vehicle to attempt to thwart Muskâs efforts to reorient the companyâ toward his free speech goals, the report states.
âThe strong inference from these facts is that Twitterâs rediscovered focus on free speech is being met with politically motivated attempts to thwart Elon Muskâs goals,â the report states.
âThe FTCâs demands did not occur in a vacuum. They appear to be the result of loud voices on the leftâincluding elected officialsâurging the federal government to intervene in Muskâs acquisition and management of the company,â the report continues. âThe FTCâs harassment of Twitter is likely due to one fact: Muskâs self-described âabsolutistâ commitment to free expression in the digital town square.â
In a statement to The Epoch Times, an FTC spokesperson defended its investigation into Twitterâs compliance with the consent decree.
âProtecting consumersâ privacy is exactly what the FTC is supposed to do,â the spokesperson said. âIt should come as no surprise that career staff at the commission are conducting a rigorous investigation into Twitterâs compliance with a consent order that came into effect long before Mr. Musk purchased the company.â