Concerns About Safety on Twitter
Dear Jack Dorsey and Vijaya Gadde,
We’re writing to you to follow up on our request for a meeting with Twitter’s Board of Directors and Shareholders. On May 20th, we delivered a letter (see “original letter” below) with this request in person to your offices in both San Francisco and New York City; this letter was also accompanied by 300,000 signatures from people across the country. We are a growing movement that is worried about the alarming and increasing hate on a platform as widely used as Twitter.
Donald Trump’s reckless use of Twitter makes our organizations’ members and their communities feel unsafe every day. He has suggested use of violence against the media and threatened nuclear and armed conflict. He has rallied the right-wing on Twitter against elected representatives, resulting in serious consequences on their physical safety.
Twitter’s updated policy dated July 9th states that “Our primary focus is on addressing the risks of offline harm, and research shows that dehumanizing language increases that risk.” A recent tweet from Donald Trump directly led to chants of “send her back!” referencing Representative Ilhan Omar at a rally in North Carolina last week. This is a dangerous, racist and anti-immigrant sentiment; in fact, the EEOC specifically states that this language could be found in violation of anti-discrimination employment law. Yet, Twitter has not found these tweets to be in violation of your Terms of Service, and you have not offered an explanation as to why. There couldn’t be a clearer connection between his dehumanizing language and offline harm.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve received hundreds of requests from our members to take bold action to remove Trump’s hate from Twitter. As previously requested, we would welcome the chance to meet with you and your team to speak about this urgent matter. We look forward to a response by August 5, 2019.
Thank you,
CREDO Mobile, Women’s March National, Women’s March San Francisco and MPower Change
ORIGINAL LETTER:
Twitter Board of Directors and Shareholders,
We’re writing to you nearly 300,000 strong with a simple request: Don't give hate a platform.
Our members have signed petitions asking Twitter to remove one of the clearest and most present dangers on its platform – Donald Trump.
Trump has demonstrated time and again that he has no compunction when it comes to spreading hate, inciting violence, spreading conspiracy theories or threatening outright war.
He has tweeted content suggesting violence against the media.
He has threatened nuclear war against North Korea and armed conflict with Iran.
His tweets against Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib have resulted in increased threats of violence against them and their families.
He repeatedly violates Twitter's Terms of Service with tweets that could start wars, crash markets, and endanger lives. But Twitter executives continue to give him a platform, justifying their inaction with claims that Trump is a public figure whose tweets are newsworthy and will therefore not be moderated, even if they violate Twitter's own Terms of Service.
Trump will never stop issuing hateful messages from his seat of power, but Twitter can stop him from issuing those messages from its platform. We want you, as shareholders, to know that more than a quarter of a million people are calling on Twitter to suspend Trump for his repeated violations of its policies and the threats his tweets pose here in the United States and to people across the world.
We urge you to use your power as investors to force Twitter to stop hiding behind excuses and do the right thing. We welcome an opportunity to meet with the Board of Directors and shareholders to discuss how we can make Twitter a safer platform for communities impacted by hate speech.
Women’s March, CREDO Mobile and MPower Change