The 'Twitter Files' journalist reveals that the censorship was even worse than he initially thought

Journalist Michael Shellenberger, who has done the nation an immense service with his work on the “Twitter Archives” showing the federal government's involvement in the “Censorship Industrial Complex,” said things are even worse than that he believed at first.

The intrepid reporter appeared on Friday's edition of “America's Newsroom” the day after testifying before the federal government's House Armaments subcommittee, delving further into Orwellian manipulation of the digital public square by from the feds and their Big Tech partners.

Perhaps most chilling was his revelation of the use of military-grade psychological operations against Americans, prompting Fox News host Bill Hemmer to question what he meant when he told the lawmakers that it was worse than he initially thought.

(Video: Fox News)

“Well, it's worse in the sense that censorship was only part of what we saw going on, both by the so-called former UK and US military contractors, but also currently employed, including some who worked for the Navy in 2020 when they created something called the Cyber ​​Threat Intelligence League, supposedly of volunteers,” Shellenberger said.

“But many of these people were actively working for the Department of Homeland Security. We also saw people from the FBI working with social media companies to censor Americans,” he continued. “But what we discovered was basically a playbook they had created to use psychological operations and disinformation tactics against the American people.”

“These are tactics that have been developed overseas by the US military and its allies. So to see them backfire on the American people really as a reaction to the election of Trump in 2016,” he say the journalist. “There was a sense in which Trump was elected because of social media and these people, potentially with the direct support of the government, engaged in using these tactics to change the online conversation and engage in mass censorship, which is what we saw. with the Twitter files, the Facebook files, and of course now it's part of the Missouri v. Biden case going to the Supreme Court.”

“One's commitment to free speech means nothing if it does not extend to your political enemies.”@Shellenberger details how the federal government worked with social media platforms to censor conservative speech in his opening statement at today's hearing. pic.twitter.com/FOqYyi6rYc

— Weapons Committee (@Weaponization) November 30, 2023

“Nine months ago, I testified and provided evidence to the subcommittee about the existence of a 'Censorship Industrial Complex,' a network of government agencies that includes the Department of Homeland Security, government contractors, and the Big Media Platform Tech that conspired to censor ordinary Americans. and elected officials for holding unfavorable views. I regret to inform the subcommittee today that the scope, power, and law-breaking nature of the censorship industrial complex are even worse than we realized realized in March,” Shellenberger said in his opening statement to the committee Thursday.

The co-author of the “Twitter Files” and his colleagues have just released the first batch of files from the Cyber ​​Threat Intelligence League (CTIL) showing US and British military contractors conducting “sophisticated psychological operations and disinformation tactics developed abroad against the American people.”

THE CTIL FILES #1

Many people insist that governments are not involved in censorship, but they are. And now, a whistleblower has come forward with an explosive new trove of documents, rivaling or surpassing the Twitter files and the Facebook files in scale and importance. pic.twitter.com/tqgSQjPIuT

— Michael Shellenberger (@shellenberger) November 28, 2023

“The CTIL files are a breakthrough because they allow us to see inside the censorship industrial complex from the perspective of the deep state,” Shellenberger said. he wrote at X. “The CTIL files are also an indictment of the media, which participated in CTIL's disinformation efforts.”

“I encourage Congress to defund and dismantle government organizations involved in censorship,” he told the committee.

Staff writer

Chris Donaldson is an ordinary, ordinary American who is concerned about rampant corruption as well as the ongoing attacks on our way of life by those who despise our hard-won freedoms. A Navy veteran, he has been a frequent contributor to conservative websites and resides in Florida.

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