MEDIA. Ben Swann talks to NewsMax about how Big Tech giants like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google are daily suppressing Americans’ freedom of speech on their own platforms. New Twitter owner Elon Musk reveals this in “Twitter Gate” and Ben Swann, founder of Sovereign Media, comments in this NewsMax interview.
Transcription: NewsVoiceTV.com | Source: NewsMax
NewsMax: Welcome back, everybody. Twitter is disbanding its trust and safety council following the release of parts three, four, and five of the Twitter files. Turns out it was really a censorship board. Documents reveal the lengths Twitter went to remove former President Donald Trump from the platform.
Many employees pushed Trump’s suspension despite top Twitter workers saying he didn’t violate any of their policies. Meanwhile, Twitter allowed several world leaders, including Iran’s Ayatolla Khomeini, to remain on the platform despite clearly promoting violence, attacks on Jews, and such.
For more on this, let’s bring in the founder and CEO of Sovereign Media, Ben Swann. Mr. Swann. Merry Christmas. Glad to have you here. You know, what’s most concerning to me is the government’s conduct in using social media to steal Americans’ rights.
America First Legal uncovered a secret Twitter portal that government officials used to suppress so-called China virus misinformation. It protected free speech. Don’t there need to be serious punishments for any government official who undertakes those kinds of crimes against our people?
Ben Swann: Well, the word you use there, Chris, and it’s good to be with you the word you use there that’s so important is crimes. These are crimes. It is illegal in the United States for any government agency to work to suppress information, to work to suppress free speech.
They cannot compel a private company. The excuse that’s used so often when it comes to these companies is, well, they’re private companies. They can do what they want. No, they can’t. Government cannot impress upon a private company to infringe upon the rights, the constitutional rights of citizens of this country.
That is a crime. And so, yeah, every single government entity, every single government individual who was involved in this should be prosecuted. They should receive jail time for this. But remember something, Chris.
This is something that’s been going on for a long time. It’s been happening with the FBI and Twitter. We know that because of the Twitter files. But there seem to be, you know, as we as we go through these Twitter files.
A very important point here that I hope is not lost on your audience, and that is that every single other major big tech platform YouTube, Google, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, every single other major big tech platform is doing the exact same thing right now that’s being revealed in the Twitter files.
It is not something that is specific to or limited to Twitter. It is the cancer that runs through all of big tech.
NewsMax: Makes sense. In my opinion. Twitter, Facebook, and Google are in violation of Section 230, but they get away with it because they have more money than God.
How difficult is it for alternative social media companies such as Sovereign Media to break into this industry that is dominated not only by monopolistic platforms that don’t follow the rules and use their market share to edge out competitors?
Ben Swann: Well, they absolutely do edge out competitors. And I think the biggest challenge is really on the technological side. Remember, these companies are not just standalone islands where they’ve created content.
They have the technology behind them and people are drawn to them. They are literally able to squash competitors on the technological side of where they exist. And they’re that’s why with Sovereign Media, one of the things we’re doing is we are building completely outside of big tech.
We are not utilizing any of the Silicon Valley technology that powers so many of these companies. Because on the one hand, you have companies like Facebook and Twitter that are really committing egregious acts against not only the consumers who use them but also against the content creators who are on their platforms.
But those companies are also. Being supported by backbone companies like AWS, Amazon Web Services, or Google Cloud. And those cloud companies have the ability to do enormous damage to people across this country.
And I think one thing that Twitter Files has been able to do for us as the public is it reveals it shows the reality of what it means to have government agencies working alongside completely unaccountable folks within the companies who simply decide on a whim that they disagree with something or that a sitting President of the United States should be censored.
Not because he even violated the rules, but because they just don’t like what he said, and they make the rules fit with whatever the offense might be.
NewsMax: Yeah, and you know what? You mentioned the backbone, the infrastructure.
That’s what took out Parler. Parler was a billion-dollar company, and then the left wing decided, oh, we can’t handle free speech anymore, and they killed Parlor, and they’ve been trying to claw back ever since.
Meantime, Congress is holding hearings today on the FTX collapse. This actually caught your attention. The company’s CEO and a Democrat donor, Sam Bankman Freed. He’s charged today with several crimes, including fraud, conspiracy.
This is after he was arrested yesterday [Dec 13, 2022], just hours before he was going to get cross-examined by lawmakers. Can you comment on the timing and what the whole meltdown says to you?
Ben Swann: Well, listen, your previous guest said something, and I totally agree.
The whole thing stinks. The timing on it is absolutely suspect. The fact that Sam Bengman Freed was arrested the night before he’s supposed to go in front of Maxine Waters committee, of all committees, right?
The same Maxine Waters to whom he made enormous political contributions and donations. The same Maxine Waters who, by the way, way only a week ago bragged about how honored she would be if Sam Bankman Fried would show up at her hearing.
And then today, she referred to him as a scam artist and has taken advantage of people, noticed she hasn’t given that money back. She’s questioning, you know, the new head of FTX, the CEO, about how much money are you able to get back.
He should have responded, ms. Chairwoman. How much are you willing to give back? So we can add that to the ledger. The reality is, is that Sam Bankrupt did what so many donors have done. Right, Chris?
He went out and bought influence and bought protection. And now it’s coming back to hurt the investors who believed in them.
NewsMax: And Ben, I know of at least one photo of this guy with Maxine Waters. I mean, I wonder how many other Democrats he was pictured after giving all that money to the Democrat Party. Ben Swan. Merry Christmas, sir. Thank you for being here.