One powerful Twitter employee implicated in the Hunter Biden censorship scandal has a history of official misconduct.
James Baker is a former FBI general counsel who was deeply involved in various investigations probing supposed connections between former President Donald Trump and Russia, according to the New York Post. The investigations proved baseless, with allegations of Russian collusion never corroborated.
Baker found himself hired as Twitter’s deputy general counsel after he was fired from the FBI in the midst of the agency’s “Russiagate” scandal.
In his new job, Baker soon found himself directing censorship of news regarding Hunter Biden’s laptop.
In internal Twitter communications following the Post’s publication of the original Hunter Biden laptop story, Baker baselessly likened the story’s contents to a foreign intelligence operation.
“It’s reasonable for us to assume that they may have been [hacked] and that caution is warranted,” Baker claimed in one internal Twitter communication — ultimately released to the public as part of the so-called “Twitter Files,” according to Fox News.
28. To which former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker again seems to advise staying the non-course, because “caution is warranted”: pic.twitter.com/tg4D0gLWI6
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) December 3, 2022
Baker backed Twitter’s censorship decision in October 2020, days after the contents of the younger Biden’s laptop were published, with the New York Post obtaining it from a Delaware computer repairman.
Twitter owner Elon Musk announced that Baker had been terminated from Twitter employment in light of the revelation, stating as such in a Tuesday tweet.
In light of concerns about Baker’s possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today
Does the lawyer's involvement with the Trump-Russia probe raise alarm bells for you?— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 6, 2022
Musk indicated that Baker had been unable to offer a convincing explanation for his role in censoring the content of the laptop story.
Yes. His explanation was …unconvincing.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 6, 2022
The FBI itself held weekly meetings with senior Twitter employees in the months before the 2020 election, according to former Twitter integrity head Yoel Roth.
Agency officials warned Twitter that foreign intelligence services would seek to compromise American political figures with hacked information.
This urging ultimately proved vital in Twitter’s decision to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story, according to Roth.
“I was told in these meetings that the intelligence community expected that individuals associated with political campaigns would be subject to hacking attacks and that material obtained through those hacking attacks would likely be disseminated over social media platforms, including Twitter,” the former Twitter employee indicated at a Dec. 2020 Federal Election Commission meeting, according to the New York Post.
No evidence has ever emerged indicating the laptop’s contents were publicized as a result of a state-backed intelligence operation.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
