After suspension of 'Unplanned' movie's Twitter account, GOP lawmaker calls for independent audit
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Missouri Senator Josh Hawley has called on Twitter chief Jack Dorsey to open the tech giant up to an independent outside audit after the temporary suspension of the account for the movie “Unplanned.”
The movie is based on the true story of Abby Johnson, who worked as a clinic director at Planned Parenthood, but resigned in 2009 and became a pro-life activist.
“Over the weekend, Twitter suspended @UnplannedMovie for no apparent reason. Latest example of deplatforming prolife and conservative voices. Time for @jack to open Twitter to a full, independent, outside audit on its speech policies - and then publish the results,” Hawley tweeted.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}'UNPLANNED' ACTRESS ON TWITTER BACKLASH: 'I COULDN'T EVEN FOLLOW MY OWN MOVIE'
Twitter says that the account was suspended in error.
The National Review reports that the GOP senator, who is a vocal critic of big tech, has sent a letter to Dorsey outlining his concerns about this weekend’s incident.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“Last week, Twitter suspend[ed] the account of the pro-life movie Unplanned—on opening weekend, no less—raising yet more questions about your supposed commitment to free speech,” he wrote, according to the National Review, which has seen a copy of the letter. “Just as bad, after you lifted the suspension, 99 percent of Unplanned’s followers mysteriously disappeared.”
The movie’s Twitter account was briefly suspended on Saturday, Variety reports. Twitter told Fox News that the company's systems mistakenly the “Unplanned” account to another account that violated its rules. “It wasn't directly about this account. When an account violates the Twitter Rules, the system looks for linked accounts to mitigate things like ban evasion,” a spokeswoman explained, via email. “In this case, the account was mistakenly caught in our automated systems for ban evasion.”
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The account was reinstated as soon as the mistake was brought to Twitter’s attention, the spokeswoman added.
Twitter said that an account's followers take time to fully replenish after it is reinstated. “We are not hiding follower counts or disallowing certain people from following,” the spokeswoman said. “We enforce our rules dispassionately and do not engage in so-called shadow banning.”
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The movie’s Twitter account now has more than 339,000 followers. “Unplanned” enjoyed a strong debut weekend, taking $6.1 million from only 1,059 theaters.
Fox News’ Caleb Parke, Sasha Savitsky and Lauren Green contributed to this article. Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers