'Full-on hypocrite': Jack Sweeny who monitored Elon Musk’s private jets slams Twitter boss after ban
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA: Elon Musk has backtracked from his promise for allowing the accounts of his Jet Tracker @ElonJet, managed by Jack Sweeny, to continue. On Wednesday, December 14 it has reportedly been suspended by Twitter after being covertly limited a week earlier, despite relating it to free expression, reports stated. Musk has come under fire from a Florida college freshman who called him a "full-on hypocrite." Following this, Sweeny expressed alarm with the suspension of his second account, SpaceXJet, which had also occurred on December 14.
Earlier citing an internal communication by an anonymous Twitter employee, Sweeny shared a screenshot asking team to apply heavy visuality filtering on his account. He shared a series of tweets terming it as "My Twitter Files on the shadow banning/filtering of @ElonJet". Soon after Sweeny found his accounts 'permanently suspended' by Twitter.
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"Internal messages obtained by an anonymous Twitter employee explained to me that on “Dec 2 2022 your account @elonjet was visibility limited/restricted to a severe degree internally,” he tweeted from his personal Twitter account. "Screenshots show Ella Irwin VP at Twitter Trust and Safety requesting elonjet to have heavy VF (visibility filtering)."
Screenshots show Ella Irwin VP at Twitter Trust and Safety requesting elonjet to have heavy VF (visibility filtering) pic.twitter.com/ehHJpo4zQR
— Jack Sweeney (@JxckSweeney) December 11, 2022
My Twitter Files on the shadow banning/filtering of @ElonJet
— Jack Sweeney (@JxckSweeney) December 11, 2022
In a conversation with the New York Post, on Wednesday, Sweeny expressed his frustration. “This is insane,” 19-year-old Sweeney told the outlet. “My phone’s going f–king nuts,” he said. Sweeney further said that Musk erred because now he is about to get negative publicity for his decision to go back on his pledge to allow unfettered speech on the platform. “He really is asking for it because it’s just going to get worse in the news,” Sweeney predicted. “He’s going to be called a full-on hypocrite.” When asked if he also thinks Musk is a “full-on hypocrite,” Sweeney replied: “Yeah, it would seem so.”
Sweeney earlier told The New York Times that Musk had contacted her and offered to pay to have the account deleted due to fears that it posed "a security risk." Later, after the outcry, when he assumed control of Twitter more than a month ago, he argued for free expression there by citing Sweeny, who was given permission to run @ElonJet despite the danger to his personal safety.
My commitment to free speech extends even to not banning the account following my plane, even though that is a direct personal safety risk
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2022
The suspension seems to go against Musk's stated principles for Twitter moderation. He has repeatedly emphasized the value of enabling "free expression" on the site and making moderator choices transparent for months. In this instance, the reason @ElonJet was suspended is still unclear, the Verge noted. Sweeny said he hasn’t received any communications from Twitter “besides the default suspension warning.” He said the suspension might be related to “my news over the weekend,” referring to his post about Irwin’s filtering request.