The journalist and author behind the so-called “The Twitter Files” that revealed the social media giant’s extreme steps to censor The Post’s Hunter Biden laptop scoop hinted about the “explosive” thread Thursday night and told his followers the four days leading up to the series of tweets were a “whirlwind.”
Matt Taibbi, known for his brazen, irreverent writing style that often ruffles feathers, was unmasked Friday night as the source of the damning Twitter censorship revelations that he backed up with insider sourcing and a series of redacted company emails.
Leading up to Friday, Musk had teased the release of details on how Twitter worked to squash The Post’s story but didn’t specify where the information would come from — or who would share it.
Taibbi, who boasts over 30,000 paid subscribers on his Substack, TK News, according to NY Magazine, told his followers Thursday night that he’d written “a unique and explosive story” that would not be published on the platform first but instead be tweeted because he “had to agree to certain conditions.”
“Those of you who’ve been here for years know how seriously I take my obligation to this site’s subscribers. On this one occasion, I’m going to have to simply ask you to trust me. As it happens, there may be a few more big surprises coming, and those will be here on Substack. And there will be room here to discuss this, too, in time,” he wrote.
“It’s been a whirlwind 96 hours for me, too,” he concluded at the end of the thread. “There is much more to come, including answers to questions about issues like shadow-banning, boosting, follower counts, the fate of various individual accounts, and more. These issues are not limited to the political right.”
It’s not clear how or why Taibbi, 52, obtained the sensitive documents from Twitter that he included in the series of tweets or if Musk personally tapped him to publish the story on his newly acquired platform.
The post included redacted emails from former Twitter employees and revealed communications the social media giant responding to a request “from the Biden team” during the run-up to the 2020 election shortly after the Post’s Hunter Biden story was published.
Catch up on Twitter’s censorship of The Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story
- Happening now: Email found on Hunter’s laptop reveals Joe Biden named in 2017 message seeking China natural gas deal
- Our original report: Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad
- Editorial: Why has the public turned against “experts”? Twitter’s secret shadow bans show why
- Dorsey bows out: Musk warns Dorsey evidence of Twitter censorship “may have been deleted”
- Musk’s musings: Elon Musk: Twitter blacklisting proves “the inmates were running the asylum”
He said the social media company “took extraordinary steps to suppress” The Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story, removing links to the expose shared by users and posting warnings that it may be “unsafe.”
In recent years, Taibbi, an author of several books, including four New York Times bestsellers, has been outspoken in his criticism of mainstream media, particularly toward liberal-leaning outlets.
He described his politics to NY Magazine last year as a “run-of-the-mill, old-school ACLU liberal,” noting his admiration for Bernie Sanders.
“The only thing I would say that’s different about my political thinking — and it has nothing to do with policy and politics — suddenly I’m getting along better with people who are Republicans,” he told the magazine.
Taibbi’s works have mercilessly attacked economic and criminal injustice among other issues.
His scathing 2014 book, “The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap.” analyzes the increasingly large wealth disparity in the US and was named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post and NPR.
In his latest book “Hate Inc.: Why Today’s Media Makes Us Despise One Another,” which was published in 2019 ahead of the 2020 election, Taibbi aggressively argues that what most Americans consider “the news” is “in fact, a twisted wing of the entertainment business.”
In 2007, he won the National Magazine Award for Columns and Commentary while writing for Rolling Stone, where he remains a contributing editor and has been likened to the magazine’s former Gonzo star, Hunter S. Thompson.
His 2010 Rolling Stone article “The Great American Bubble Machine” famously described Goldman Sachs as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.”
Taibbi angered conservatives with a 2012 obituary he wrote in Rolling Stone, entitled “Andrew Breitbart: Death of a Douche,” after the Breitbart founder’s death.
Taibbi, 52, additionally co-hosts the “Useful Idiots” political podcast with comedian and writer Katie Harper.
Musk confirmed that Twitter would host a Q&A session on Taibbi’s report tomorrow, although he did not say when. It’s not clear if Taibbi will be answering questions.
On Thursday, Taibbi claimed victory at the annual Munk Debates in Toronto, in which he and conservative commentator and Post columnist Douglas Murray faced off against author Malcolm Gladwell and New York Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg in a debate over whether the media can be trusted.
Taibbi and Murray convinced a record-breaking margin of the audience at the annual event to abandon the idea that media can be free of bias, The National Review reported.
“Be it resolved: don’t trust the mainstream media,” Taibbi said during his opening remarks to start the debate.
“I grew up in the press. My father was a reporter. My stepmother was a reporter. My godparents were reporters. Every adult I knew growing up seemed to be in media. I love the news business. It’s in my bones. But I mourn for it. It’s destroyed itself.”
Taibbi argued that the mainstream media has bailed on its pledge to neutrality in favor of catering to a smaller, like-minded audience that stayed faithful to traditional media after technology completely changed the advertising industry, according to the National Review.
