Popular social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter and owned by the world’s second-richest man, Elon Musk, has said it will cease its operations in Brazil following what it described as “censorship orders” by Brazilian judge Alexandre de Moraes.
According to X, the Brazilian judge assigned to the country’s supreme court had reportedly threatened to arrest its representative in Brazil if the court orders to take down some content from its platform were not complied with.
In a statement, X published pictures of a document allegedly signed by Moraes. However, X said that, for the safety of its staff, it has decided to shut down its operations in Brazil with immediate effect.
“To protect the safety of our staff, we have made the decision to close our operation in Brazil, effective immediately,” X said.
According to the documents, a daily fine of 20,000 reais ($3,653) and an arrest decree would be imposed against X representative Rachel Nova Conceicao if the platform did not fully comply with Moraes’ orders.
Although the social media platform was confirmed to be still available to Brazilian users as of Saturday, Brazil’s Supreme Court has reportedly refused to comment on the documents shared on X.
It was also gathered that earlier this year, Moraes had issued X an order to block certain accounts, as he claimed the action was in lieu of an ongoing investigation at the time.
Prior reports indicate that Moraes was investigating people who had been previously accused of spreading fake news and hate messages during the government of far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro and described them as “digital militias.”
Although the X office in Brazil complied with the order, the media platform’s CEO, Elon Musk, later challenged the Supreme Court judge, saying he would lift all the restrictions because Moraes’ orders were unconstitutional. He also called on Moraes to resign, leading the Supreme Court judge to thereafter open an enquiry on the billionaire who actually reactivated the accounts of Brazilian users whose accounts were ordered blocked by the judge.
“Due to demands by “Justice” @Alexandre in Brazil that would require us to break (in secret) Brazilian, Argentinian, American and international law, 𝕏 has no choice but to close our local operations in Brazil,” Musk wrote in a post on X on Saturday as he described Moraes as an “utter disgrace to justice,” adding that the company could not have agreed to the judge’s secret censorship and private information handover demands.
“He is an utter disgrace to justice,” Elon Musk wrote at the bottom of his post.
