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Twitter suspends 70 pro-Bloomberg accounts

The accounts were posting identical messages.

 

Eilish O'Sullivan

Tech

Posted on Feb 22, 2020   Updated on Jan 27, 2021, 4:39 pm CST

Twitter on Friday suspended around 70 accounts that were posting identical pro-Michael Bloomberg messages, the Los Angeles Times has learned. The accounts broke Twitter’s rules “against platform manipulation and spam.”

“A President Is Born: Barbra Streisand sings Mike’s praises. Check out her tweet,” one tweet, which was posted by multiple accounts, reportedly read.

Many of the accounts in question, which may be restored if the account holders can prove their complete ownership, were created within the last two months. Bloomberg launched his bid for the White House in November of 2019.

Some of the accounts belong to the Bloomberg campaign’s “deputy digital organizers,” who were recently hired for $2,500 a month to, in part, create social media content.

“We ask that all of our deputy field organizers identify themselves as working on behalf of the Mike Bloomberg 2020 campaign on their social media accounts,” a Bloomberg campaign spokesperson told the Daily Dot in an email statement. “Through Outvote content is shared by staffers and volunteers to their network of friends and family and was not intended to mislead anyone.”

Twitter suspended the accounts after the Times reviewed and reported them.

The campaign has also recently unprecedently hired influencers and meme creators to appeal to young voters.

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H/T Los Angeles Times

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*First Published: Feb 22, 2020, 9:15 am CST