Investigative journalist Matt Taibbi published a new thread Tuesday on how “Twitter Let the Intelligence Community In.” These files reveal just how little data the government had and needed to launch the four-year hoax of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.

The genesis: It started in August 2017, after Facebook suspended 300 accounts with “suspected Russian origin.” This was the genesis of the question of Russian election meddling through social media. Facebook was the sole focus at first. Internal Twitter e-mails even show that Twitter was so certain that it wasn’t affected by Russian accounts, it simply redirected such inquiries to Facebook.

• “Twitter is not the focus of inquiry into Russian election meddling right now—the spotlight is on FB,” said Public Policy vice president Colin Crowell.

The next month, Twitter ran a routine review on 2,700 suspected accounts. In that group, it found just 22 possible Russian accounts and 179 other accounts potentially linked to them. And that is all the government needed to make the Facebook problem a Twitter problem too.

A mountain from a molehill: Virginia Senator Mark Warner was furious. Twitter is “frankly inadequate on every level,” he said. Hillary Clinton said, “It’s time for Twitter to stop dragging its heels and live up to the fact that its platform is being used as a tool for cyberwarfare.” Twitter was then in every news cycle and getting bad press. This forced Twitter to form the Russia Task Force to investigate. But even then, it found “no evidence of a coordinated approach” with only 15 high-risk accounts, two of which belonged to Russian media organization RT.

The lack of evidence only worsened the attacks on Twitter. Congress began to threaten legislation, calling Twitter an “effective disinformation platform.” Twitter vowed to work with Congress to limit political advertising that disagreed with the government.

The Senate had found its formula:

• Threaten Twitter with legislation.
• Leak misrepresented information to the press and create a public relations crisis for Twitter.
• Force Twitter to allow the government to moderate and personally ask for accounts to get suspended, well beyond the scope of the Russia hoax.

The government used the Russia hoax to get its foot in the door. There weren’t enough accounts with ties to Russia to affect the entire presidential election. But there were enough for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Senate to begin seizing control. It got so bad, that even Rep. Adam Schiff would tell Twitter of accounts he personally wanted suspended.

Twitter tried to push back. But these leftist-controlled government organizations were determined to create a Big Brother kind of oversight and control. Twitter ultimately caved. The Russia hoax was not only a tool to destroy the chief opposition to this goal, but also a means to achieve it.

Learn more: Read our article “Dark Truths Exposed” from the latest Trumpet issue.