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Ron DeSantis presses Congress to reign in Apple after tech giant threatens to bar Twitter following Musk takeover
By jdheyes // 2022-12-01
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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is no stranger to the culture wars, and anytime he sees a battle brewing, he is among the first to wade right in. The newly reelected Republican, who may be eying a 2024 presidential run, reacted strongly to a threat this week from Apple CEO Tim Cook to remove Twitter from Apple's App Store because he doesn't like that new owner Elon Musk is unbanning accounts and promoting actual free speech on the platform. In fact, DeSantis is pushing Republicans in Congress, who will take over control of the House in January, to step up like him and take action against Apple if it bans Twitter from its store. “That would be a huge, huge mistake, and it would be a really raw exercise of monopolistic power that I think would merit a response from the United States Congress,” DeSantis told an audience in Duval County, Florida, on Tuesday. His comments come after Musk tweeted that Apple was pulling its ads from the platform like other major advertisers as they cave to left-wing pressure campaigns because they are led by woke cowards. “Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?” Musk asked on Twitter. “Apple has also threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store,” he posted, “but won’t tell us why.” The tech billionaire also directly asked CEO Tim Cook: “What’s going on?” The Epoch Times noted further: Outside of DeSantis, other Republicans said that Apple and Google have too much control over the internet via their respective app-downloading stores. Removing Twitter from both would mean that the social media app would be heavily limited in its growth and usage. Parler, a social media platform favored by conservatives, was removed from the App Store, Google Play, and Amazon Web Services days after the Jan. 6 Capitol incident. For more than a month, the website was not accessible, and data shows that its usage significantly dropped during that time period and has never recovered. “This is why we need to end the App Store duopoly before the end of this year. No one should have this kind of market power,” Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo) wrote on the platform. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), who co-sponsored a piece of legislation that targets app stores, added that “Apple and Google currently have a stranglehold on companies and have used their leverage to bully businesses.” For his part, Cook was non-committal about the intent to deplatform Twitter from the App Store. “They say that they are going to continue to moderate and so … I count on them to do that," he said during a Nov. 15 interview, The Epoch Times reported. As for DeSantis, it appears he is gearing up for a presidential run. Specifically, he is set to release his autobiography. "The book, which documents the popular GOP governor’s rise from a star Little League baseball player to one of the most significant figures in politics, is due out in February, just in time for potential presidential contenders to begin building a war chest and campaign organization ahead of the 2024 election," Conservative Brief reported on Wednesday. "While DeSantis has not announced plans to challenge former President Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, books such as this often precede White House bids," The Daily Wire added. Sources include: TheEpochTimes.com ConservativeBrief.com
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