Others were concerned on Wednesday that Twitter’s designation of National Public Radio as “state-affiliated media” may erode trust in the news organization.
John Lansing, the president and CEO of NPR, said it was upsetting to see the description appended to every tweet the organization puts out and that it was “wrong for Twitter to characterize us this way.”
Why Twitter changed was a mystery. Elon Musk, the owner of Twitter, cited the company’s standards as defining state-affiliated media as “outlets where the state exerts influence over editorial content via financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution.”
In response to NPR, Musk tweeted, “Seems correct.”
NPR does receive financing from the US government in the form of grants from several departments and federal agencies, in addition to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The business claimed that its share of NPR’s yearly operational budget is less than 1%. The same Twitter policies, however, stated that “state-financed media organizations with editorial independence, such the BBC in the UK or NPR in the United States, are not classified as state-affiliated media for the purposes of this policy” up until Wednesday.
On Twitter’s website, NPR has now been deleted from that statement.
When contacted for response, Twitter’s publicity department sent a pre-programmed feces emoji. Just a few days before, Twitter had removed The New York Times’ verification check mark.
Millions of listeners rely on NPR and its member stations for their independent, fact-based journalism, according to Lansing. “NPR supports the right to free expression and accountability for the powerful.”
In its request that Twitter reconsider the action, the literary group PEN America emphasized how NPR “assiduously preserves editorial independence.”
The decision by Twitter is “a risky step that might further erode public faith in reputable news sources,” according to Liz Woolery, PEN America’s director of digital policy.
