FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE –
Congressional candidate Rebekah Jones (FL-1) seeks to have her @GeoRebekah Twitter account restored at once.
Jones recently lost access to her @GeoRebekah twitter account, where the whistleblower and scientist maintained an active following of more than 400,000 users at the time of her unjustified suspension.
A spokesperson for the office of Ron DeSantis, C. Pushaw – who has herself used multiple accounts to troll, stalk, and harass Jones and her followers and still has an active charge against her in Maryland for violating Jones’ April restraining order against her – celebrated the automated suspension by Twitter, thus silencing this much-needed voice of truth and reason in a press release, falsely accusing her of “platform manipulation” by purchasing followers through a third-party application.
According to an article in Forbes, Jones’ following showed consistent and organic growth since she blew the whistle on the state for lying to the public during COVID-19 last year. Only within the last few months – during the same period of time that Pushaw led an online smear and disinformation campaign – did any suspicious activity in user growth appear.
While there is no way to definitively prove who made the purchases or from where, Pushaw’s continued aggression toward this whistleblower goes beyond just unethical and immoral – it’s a violation of Florida law.
Even though Twitter sent Jones notice that her account was suspended due to violations of the spam policy, for allegedly over-zealously sharing a news article by the Miami Herald that exposed her former employers and the Governor, the Governor’s office began immediately lying to the public about the cause of the suspension in yet another failed attempt to smear Jones.
The governor’s office did this in direct violation of Florida Statutes 112.3187, known as “the Whistleblower law,” which protects those who file complaints from any adverse action or retaliation by the state.
Desantis’ own “anti-big tech” law, set to go in effect July 1 though its future remains doubtful, prohibits Twitter or other social media platforms for “deplatforming” candidates for elected office.
Whether whistleblowers, congressional candidates, or both, an open forum for free speech should be encouraged when that speech is informative and factual. When critics of the state can be locked out of social media for nothing other than sharing news articles, however prolifically the sharing may be, Twitter effectively silences voices of dissent on behalf of governments.
We ask only that Twitter’s policies being enforced uniformly. Jones has been the subject of targeted stalking, harassment and smear campaigns with fewer than a dozen accounts suspended for their hateful behavior. Yet, Twitter expects the public to believe it suspended the account of a powerful governor’s most prominent critic for “spam.”
Please Tweet to or message @Twitter, @TwitterSupport @TwitterComms and advocate for Jones to have her account – and thus, her direct line with the people – restored and protected during ongoing lawsuits against the state and any campaigns she may manage in the future.
You can also email Twitter directly at: Support@Twitter.com
Click below to tweet your support:
@TwitterSupport @TwitterComms @TwitterSafety
Tweet
Restore @GeoRebekah at once! Her #Whistleblower & #Campaign account is what makes @Twitter great;
Suspending @GeoRebekah is the type of thing that destroys it and erodes trust in @Jack.
#RestoreRebekah