Arizona’s Democrat Gov. Katie Hobbs used her position as secretary of state to demand that social media companies censor her critics, newly surfaced emails show. The emails reveal that Hobbs equates supporters of President Donald Trump to neo-Nazis and then uses that false label to demand they are silenced.
In emails to Twitter, now known as X, Hobbs pressured the company to censor Trump supporters and her critics.
Hobbs had previously attacked Trump and his supporter base in public tweets.
In a contentious 2017 tweet during her tenure in the Arizona state legislature, Hobbs described Trump’s supporters as “his neo-nazi base.”
“Trump has made it abundantly clear he’s more interested in pandering to his neo-nazi base than being president for all Americans,” she stated.
The assertion from Hobbs drew widespread condemnation from social media users.
This criticism wasn’t taken lightly by Hobbs.
She ascended into her role as Arizona secretary of state while these contentious debates raged on.
Hobbs’ contentious social media posting subsequently ignited debates over her impartiality in administering elections in her role as Arizona’s secretary of state.
In response, the Democrat leader demanded the censorship of online judgments against her.
Leaked emails from Hobbs’ office have been confirmed by Arizona Capitol Oversight, a conservative political entity.
They reveal that Hobbs officially contacted Twitter in November 2020 to sanction her online critics.
However, when Twitter demanded further details to justify Hobbs’ request, she was unable to produce the required evidence.
Instead, she laid claim to being “harassed” by political opponents for her comments labeling them as Nazis.
Hobbs went on to argue that they had weaponized a three-year-old tweet to spread threatening messages.
Despite countless appeals for responses from Twitter and Hobbs regarding the censorship requests, reactions have yet to surface.
In the shadow of these unfolding revelations, there is mounting evidence that many more federal departments than expected could be deliberately downplaying their engagement in online censorship.
