DeSantis supports Elon Musk in defense of free speech against Apple censorship

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is taking Apple to task for its alleged threats to remove Twitter from the App Store.

As detailed by Rebel News, Twitter owner Elon Musk accused Apple and its CEO Tim Cook of censoring companies from the app store. He alleged that Apple, which maintains a duopoly on smart phones alongside Google, threatened to remove Twitter from their store for reasons that were not disclosed to him.

In the governor’s opening remarks at a press conference on Tuesday, DeSantis lent his voice to the fight against the tech giant, calling it out for restricting AirDrop in China amidst the ongoing protests, which previously allowed activists to evade censorship and surveillance by directly communicating with one another through the function.

Gov DeSantis on @Apple threatening to remove @elonmusk’s @Twitter from the App Store:

“Don’t be a vassal of the CCP on one hand, and then use your corporate power in the United States on the other to suffocate Americans and try to suppress their right to express themselves.” https://t.co/vwwpqcKZrC

— Jeremy Redfern (@JeremyRedfernFL) November 29, 2022

“There’s reports that Apple is not allowing the protesters to use this air-drop function where they’re trying to communicate that,” the governor said. “Obviously, it’s providing aid and comfort to the CCP and you see that report and that’s very concerning and then when you also hear reports that Apple is threatening to remove Twitter from the App Store because Elon Musk is actually opening it up for free speech and is restoring a lot of accounts that were unfairly and illegitimately suspended for putting accurate information about COVID,” DeSantis continued.

“That’s one of the main things that’s being reinstated, so many of these experts were wrong at and you had people on Twitter that were calling that out and Twitter, the old regime in Twitter, their response was to try and suffocate the dissent and Elon Musk knows that’s not a winning formula, and so he’s providing free speech,” said DeSantis, who praised Musk’s efforts in fighting for freedom of speech.

Referring to the potential removal of Twitter from Apple’s App Store, the governor said that removing Twitter from the app store would be an abuse of the company’s monopolistic power and accused Apple of kowtowing to the CCP for using its power to “suffocate Americans.”

DeSantis praised Musk for his reinstatement of accounts previously banned by Twitter’s old regime, calling it “big progress” in the expansion and defense of free speech.

“Don’t be a vassal to the CCP on one hand and then use your corporate power in the United States on the other to suffocate Americans and suppress their right to express themselves and so I’m glad things are changing at Twitter and I know there’s a lot to do with Big Tech generally, but this is big progress and we’re really happy that that is now happening,” DeSantis said.