Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Wednesday said Twitter’s new ban on political ads on its platform will serve to crowd out less well-known voices and help clear the field for elites.
“Twitter’s announced policy would not level the playing field - it will only reinforce echo chambers,” the Kentucky Republican said in a Senate floor speech. “It would prevent a local candidate on a shoestring budget from using a small amount of money to promote a tweet so more of his neighbors can learn about his campaign.”
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announced last week that his platform will no longer run political ads, saying political message reach should be “earned” and not “bought.”
But Mr. McConnell said there’s a fine line between expressly political ads and newspaper columnists or celebrities using the platform to blast out their personal views to their hordes of followers.
“Such a policy would not bolster our democracy — it would degrade democracy,” he said. “It would amplify the advantage of media companies, celebrities, and certain other established elites while denying an important tool to the Americans who disagree with them.”
“My personal view is that the American people do not need elites to pre-determine which political speakers are legitimate and which are not,” he said.
He said Twitter, as a private company, is free to set its own policy, but that threats from Democrats to impose new regulations on political ads are influencing leaders.
“Companies respond to incentives,” Mr. McConnell said. “It’s easy to see the influence of Washington and leading Democrats behind this announcement - pretty easy.”
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has defended his company’s decision to allow political ads on its platform, though the company did take steps recently to try to prevent the platform from being used for election interference efforts.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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