Did the White House Break the Law by Deleting Its Misleading Tweet?
- November 5, 2022
Matt Margolis, PJ Media
A watchdog group called Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT), says that the White House may have violated the law when it deleted a tweet about Social Security after it was fact-checked by the Elon Musk-controlled Twitter.
PPT’s mission is to expose “self-dealing, conflicts of interest, and improper and illegal behavior of senior officials.” The group is calling for an investigation to determine whether the deletion of the tweet was a violation of the Presidential Records Act, which prohibits the destruction of presidential records without permission.
“Enforcement of public records laws, such as FOIA, is virtually impossible if records retention policies are not enforced, including those covering social media,” Michael Chamberlain, PPT director, said in a statement. “If the American public is going to trust its government, these policies must be enforced equally, regardless of who is in power, and skirting the requirements to avoid embarrassment or political backlash must not be seen as legitimate justifications.”