Trump Signs an Executive Order After Fact Check by Twitter

On Thursday, President Trump signed an executive order that aims to limit the rights of private tech companies like Twitter and Facebook, after Twitter placed a fact checked label under two of his tweets this week.

The tweets claimed that casting ballots by mail allows for voter fraud, when in fact both Republican and Democratic states have used this method without any mention of widespread misrepresentation. The President made these claims without presenting any evidence of the accusation.

Twitter responded calling Trump’s order “a politicized approach to a landmark law … (that will) threaten the future of online speech and Internet freedoms.”

Trump then retaliated by saying the platform silences conservative voices, but once again did not provide any evidence of said censorship.

The executive order is believed to have little weight, as it “does not change existing federal law and will have no bearing on federal courts.” The only way any major changes would take effect is if the law was passed by Congress.

Kate Klonick, a professor at St. John’s University School of Law in New York is quoted, saying:

“It flies in the face of 25 years of judicial precedent, that has been federal precedent in almost every circuit court, It’s not the role of the president to interpret federal law.”

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