Twitter Censorship? Site Blocks Video From Republican Over 'Inflammatory' Abortion Comments

Twitter blocked a video advertisement Monday from Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn, R-TN, after the social media platform deemed content in the video to be “inflammatory” and “likely to evoke a strong negative reaction.”

The advertisement, meant to announce the launch of Congresswoman Blackburn’s campaign for a Senate seat in Tennessee, took a stance against a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion and claimed to have “fought Planned Parenthood” and “stopped the sale of baby body parts.”

According to the Associated Press, Twitter took issue with Blackburn’s specific claim about the sale of baby body parts and said the advertisement could run on the platform if the flagged statement was removed.

The decision by Twitter to not allow the ad to appear on its platform only prevents the direct upload and promotion of the video. It can still be shared through links to other content video hosting services like YouTube.

Blackburn and her campaign have urged followers to share the video. “Twitter shut down our video ad, claiming it's ‘inflammatory’ and ‘negative,’” the Twitter account for Blackburn’s campaign said in a tweet. Blackburn invited followers to “join me in standing up to Silicon Valley” by retweeting the video, which still appeared to play on the platform.

The Blackburn campaign did not respond to request for comment regarding Twitter’s decision to remove the ad.

In the ad, Blackburn identifies herself as “100 percent pro-life.” She also claims to have stopped Planned Parenthood, a nonprofit organization that provides reproductive health care and sex education services, from selling baby body parts.

The claim stems from a 2015 video published by the Center for Medical Progress that claimed to show undercover footage of Dr. Deborah Nucatola, the senior director of medical services for Planned Parenthood, admitting the organization sells organs from aborted fetuses.

The video became a talking point for conservative candidates during the 2016 U.S. presidential primaries and resulted in a Congressional panel—headed by Congresswoman Blackburn—being created to investigate Planned Parenthood and its practices with fetal tissue research.

While the videos claim to show the representative of Planned Parenthood admitting to selling infant body parts for profit, the tapes have come under considerable scrutiny for being strategically edited.

It is also worth noting that it is legal to provide fetal tissue to researchers as long as no profit is made, a practice that Planned Parenthood does admit to as it is not illegal and it provides valuable material for research into a number of medical conditions.

While Blackburn’s claim may be factually incorrect—a number of states, including Texas, Georgia, Kansas and Florida all concluded the organization had followed all legal requirements in donating fetal tissue—it is not clear what Twitter may have found so objectionable about the video to block it.

The platform is likely especially sensitive to the type of content that is promoted on the site after it was revealed that the platform was used by Russian accounts to spread false information and promote controversial narratives during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Twitter did not respond to request for comment.