Twitter Threatens to Sue Hate-Speech Research Group Over Claims That Hateful, Racist Content Has Proliferated Under Elon Musk’s Ownership

variety.com:

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Elon Musk has taken legal aim at the Center for Countering Digital Hate, an independent research nonprofit group, over the organization’s findings that since the multibillionaire acquired Twitter (now called X) hate, racism and disinformation on the social platform has substantially increased. “Musk and his legal team, led by attorney Alex Spiro at Quinn Emanuel, have engaged in an aggressive campaign to intimidate, bully, and silence CCDH,” the organization said in a statement released Monday. “While Elon Musk proclaims to be a ‘free speech absolutist,’ his actions against CCDH show the lengths he will go to silence those who seek to hold him to account.” The Center for Countering Digital Hate publishing findings that Twitter failed to take action against 99 of 100 Twitter Blue accounts the organization reported for hate-speech violations.

A July 20 letter from Spiro to the organization called the CCDH’s research “false, misleading or both” and said X Corp. is “investigating whether CCDH’s false and misleading claims about Twitter are actionable” under U.S.

law. In addition, he wrote, the company has “reason to believe” that the CCDH is “supported by funding from X Corp.’s commercial competitors, as well as government entities and their affiliates.” “Twitter takes its commitment to free speech, the enforcement of its rules and policies protecting users, and its strong relationships with its advertising partners all extremely seriously… to the extent that CCDH is passing off as impartial ‘research’ material that is in fact being funded in support of an ulterior agenda, your representations are all the more misleading,” Spiro’s letter said.