The service, formerly known as Twitter X, will immediately suspend all operations in Brazil after Supreme Electoral Court President and Federal Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes threatened one of the company’s legal representatives with arrest “if he does not comply with censorship orders.”
X’s Global Government Affairs account posted about the incident at X, saying the threat was made under secret orders, but the request was shared to “expose his actions.”
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The company is reportedly shutting down its operations in the country “to ensure the safety” of X’s employees.
The company will relocate its operations out of Brazil, but X will continue to be available to Brazilian nationals.
Moraes reportedly asked X to remove certain content from the site, but the company refused, with X’s owner Elon Musk tweeting that complying with the order would “require (secretly) breaking Brazilian, Argentinian, US and international law.”
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A post in Global Affairs also criticized Moraes.
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“We are deeply saddened that we have been forced to take this decision, for which only Alexandre de Moraes is responsible,” the statement said. “His actions are incompatible with democratic politics. The Brazilian people are now forced to choose between democracy and Alexandre de Moraes.”
The move comes after months of back and forth between Moraes and Musk. In April, the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee released a report alleging that the Brazilian government was trying to force social media platforms, including X, to censor more than 300 accounts, including that of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.
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