Elon Musk announced on Twitter that the accounts of journalists he suspended will be reinstated. He said that following a poll result in which Twitter asked whether the block should be lifted. He also previously used a poll to ask whether Donald Trump should be allowed back on Twitter.
“You spoke,” the owner of the platform writes on his account. He asked Twitter users whether the suspension should be lifted now or later. The majority chose the former.
Musk says anyone who shared their location and was then suspended will “regain access to the account immediately.”
Musk’s announcement comes on the heels of a troubled few days on the platform that began with the suspension of @elonjet, a Twitter account that tracked the flight details of Musk’s private jet.
Subsequently, prominent journalists working for CNN and the New York Times, among others, were banned from the platform by Musk for seven days.
The billionaire claimed to have endangered the safety of his family by writing, sometimes indirectly, about the whereabouts of his plane.
The suspensions have been met with fierce criticism on Twitter internationally. UN chief António Guterres said he was “deeply concerned”, Reporters Without Borders (RSF), an organization dedicated to press freedom, spoke of “a threat to democracy” and media organizations and several countries also they condemned the move.
