Bartiromo on ‘free speech crackdown’ after after AWS suspension of Parler
Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo asks, ‘How do you make the case there was violence on Parler’ and not on other social media platforms including Twitter?
FOX Business anchor 玛丽亚·巴蒂罗莫（Maria Bartiromo） argued on Monday that the suspension of upstart social media platform 说话 通过 亚马孙, 苹果 和 谷歌 following Wednesday’s 我们. 国会暴动 could be “共谋” and a coordinated effort “to put a competitor out of business.”
Speaking on “美国新闻室” 在星期一, the morning after Amazon Web Services (AWS) suspended Parler, Bartiromo called the bans by Big Tech a “coordinated attack” against the alternative social media platform and free speech.
说话 went down early Monday following AWS’ decision to suspend Parler from its cloud hosting service.
Amazon says the move was made for violating AWS’ terms of services by failing to effectively deal with a steady increase in violent content, according to an email by an AWS Trust and Safety team to Parler, seen by Reuters. An Amazon spokesperson confirmed the letter was authentic.
During an interview on “Mornings with Maria” 在星期一, CEO John Matze told users to “hold on and come back” as the company figures out how to move forward.
“We’re going to figure this out,” Matze said, adding that “it’s going to be devastating to our business, our model [和] our potential to raise future capital.”
在星期一, Bartiromo acknowledged the suspensions will have devastating consequences for Parler.
“If you’re not on the app store, a company like Parler literally can go out of business,” 她说, noting that “in order to grow, they need you to buy the app on the app store.”
“So you are looking at a coordinated effort across social media to pretty much put this company out of business,” 她补充说.
APPLE AND GOOGLE SUSPEND PARLER FROM THEIR APP STORES
Matze also told Bartiromo on Monday that “at this point we may even have to go as far as buying and building our own data centers and buying up our own servers if we need to get back on the Internet.”
“But there’s still risk involved in that given what vendors are doing and the extent they’re going to get rid of us,” 他继续.
He argued that Amazon, Apple and Google’s suspension of his social media platform is “a pretty prime example” of antitrust, adding that he believes Big Tech is using the violence at the Capitol as an excuse to “squash” their first real competitor.
Speaking on “周日上午期货” the day before, Matze also called the moves to suspend his app “obvious collusion” and an effort to “stifle free speech and competition in the marketplace.”
Google suspended Parler from its app store Friday due to a failure to moderate “egregious content” posted by users related to the violent siege on Capitol Hill last week.
Parler is facing criticism over Wednesday’s riot that saw supporters of President Trump storm into the U.S. 国会大厦, attack police, vandalize the building and steal items.
Screenshots taken from Parler and shared on other social media platforms appear to show Parler users openly discussing plans for violence at the rally that preceded the attack on the Capitol, including bringing weapons and imagining how they would wield them against their political opponents.
Apple also suspended Parler from its App Store even as it surged to the No. 1 spot in the free apps section.
An Apple spokesperson said in a statement to FOX Business, “We have always supported diverse points of view being represented on the App Store, but there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity.”
“Parler has not taken adequate measures to address the proliferation of these threats to people’s safety,” 声明继续. “We have suspended Parler from the App Store until they resolve these issues.”
Bartiromo said she finds it “hard to believe that it was something happening on Parler that had anything to do with the disaster that happened on Capitol Hill on Wednesday that attacked our democracy and the breach of the Capitol.”
She pointed to “Hang Mike Pence” trending on Twitter on Friday night, 与约 14,000 tweets after the social media platform banned Trump “due to the risk of further incitement of violence,” 根据报道.
Bartiromo then asked, “How do you make the case that there was violence on Parler and not on all these other sites?”
星期日, 代表. 德文·纽恩斯（Devin Nunes）, R-Calif。, called for a racketeering investigation following Amazon, Apple and Google’s decisions to suspend Parler.
During an interview on “周日上午期货” Nunes said Amazon, Apple and Google’s suspension of Parler is “clearly a violation'” 的 antitrust, civil rights and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, which is a federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization.
“I don’t know where the hell the 司法部 is at right now or the FBI,” the ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence said on Sunday.
第二天, speaking on “美国新闻室,” Bartiromo agreed with Nunes saying, “This has to be something that the Department of Justice and the 联邦调查局 would look at.”
Bartiromo also agreed with Matze on Monday saying that Big Tech’s suspension of Parler “is a perfect example” of antitrust abuse “given the fact that these companies have become so dominant that they are able to just wipe out another company [和] put them out of business.”
An FBI spokesperson told Fox News, “Per our usual policy, the FBI does not confirm or deny the existence of investigations.” The DOJ did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment.
福克斯商业’ Brittany De Lea, James Leggate and Audrey Conklin contributed to this report.
