Donald Trump may have pardoned former national security advisor Michael Flynn, but he can’t do anything to keep the conspiracy theorist and convicted felon on his favorite social media site. NBC News reporters Ben Collins and Brandy Zadrozny wrote on Friday that Michael Flynn and Trump lawyer Sidney Powell had been permanently banned from the social media platform after spreading QAnon conspiracies that helped, in part, spark a MAGA riot that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Trump’s behalf on Wednesday.
QAnon followers, who believe Trump was elected to save the United States from a cabal of Satan-worshipping, cannibalistic child predators in the Democratic Party and also Hollywood, played a huge part in organizing and carrying out mob violence in Washington, D.C. that left five people dead and resulted in the biggest breach of the U.S. Capitol since the War of 1812. And as arrests of those responsible and talk of a second impeachment of Trump for inciting the violence dominated news coverage on Friday, word that several Trump surrogates were banned from Twitter also made the rounds:
Flynn and Powell both counseled with Trump at the White House in recent weeks as part of efforts to overturn election results. They are also high-profile figures in the QAnon community, and Flynn even took an “oath” to the conspiracy theory last year.
“The accounts have been suspended in line with our policy on Coordinated Harmful Activity. We’ve been clear that we will take strong enforcement action on behavior that has the potential to lead to offline harm, and given the renewed potential for violence surrounding this type of behavior in the coming days, we will permanently suspend accounts that are solely dedicated to sharing QAnon content,” a Twitter spokesperson told NBC News.
This is, perhaps, the least of Powell’s worries: Friday brought word that Dominion Voting Systems is suing her to the tune of $1.3 billion for amplifying false claims that the company committed widespread voter fraud in an effort to steal the election from Donald Trump.
The report also noted that the person many believe to be behind many widespread QAnon posts, Ron Watkins, who runs the message board where Q drops are now posted, also had his account deleted. The conspiracy, apart from being completely baseless and wildly detached from reality, originated from a game on message boards far removed from the mainstream. That the conspiracy became popular and was openly shared on a more mainstream site, and it took real-world violence and sedition to remove it from Twitter, really speaks to the long leash afforded to Trump and his followers. After Wednesday, and with Trump’s days in office officially numbered, that stance appears to be changing.
(Via NBC News)