Twitter briefly discouraged customers from accessing a link to an NPR article about Donald Trump’s visit to Arlington National Cemetery, sparking concerns over whether the Elon Musk-owned platform is censoring content related to the former president.
On Thursday, NPR reporter Stephen Fowler shared a link to a report in which a military official alleged that an employee at Arlington National Cemetery was “suddenly pushed away” during an event attended by Trump and members of his campaign earlier this week. A physical confrontation reportedly erupted between campaigners and volunteers at the cemetery, allegedly sparked by the controversy surrounding federal regulations prohibiting political activities within the hallowed grounds.
Customers attempting to access a story on X via hyperlink have been met with a warning message cautioning them that the link has been deemed “potentially unsafe” by the platform. The notification asserts that the link may be malicious, violent, spammy or violate X’s guidelines, but fails to provide clear reasoning behind its flagging. Fowler shared a thread on X, each tweet in the series linking back to his article; intriguingly, this link had a noticeable impact on the first two instances but seemingly not on subsequent ones, with the reasons behind this disparity unclear. It’s highly unusual for a warning to precede a link to a prominent online destination. The article lacks uniformity in its labeling of external links, as seen with the absence of a clear distinction between links to NPR and other sources.
When questioned by an NPR journalist, an X representative attributed the advisory’s appearance to a “false optimism” issue and asserted it had been rectified. The corporation failed to provide further clarification.
Notably, Elon Musk has consistently voiced his support for President Donald Trump, most recently engaging in a lengthy online conversation with him via Twitter. Elon Musk has been embroiled in a public spat with NPR for several months last year, taking issue with the “state-affiliated media” label on its Twitter account. NPR has been dormant on its influential platform account on X since a label was applied last April, sparking speculation about the potential reasons behind this silence.
This story has been updated with additional details provided by an X spokesperson and ensures the link is no longer flagged as “not safe.”
