Trump campaign worked with Musk’s X to keep leaked JD Vance file off platform
Donald Trump’s presidential campaign worked with X to prevent information about his running mate JD Vance from being posted on the social media platform, a move that resulted in the journalist who revealed the information being kicked off the site, according to reports.
The former president’s team contacted X, owned by the billionaire Trump backer Elon Musk, about a 271-page document compiled by his campaign to vet Vance that was linked to by Ken Klippenstein, an independent journalist, the New York Times has reported.
X responded by blocking links to the material, claiming that it contained sensitive personal information such as the Ohio US senator’s social security number, and banned Klippenstein from the platform.
The materials published by Klippenstein on his Substack in September appear to be related to a hack of the Trump campaign earlier this year, which the FBI has linked to Iran. Documents from the hack have been shared with several media outlets, which have chosen to not publish them.
Media outlets did not reach the same decision when they gave significant attention to files from Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign that were hacked and leaked by Russian intelligence before she ultimately lost that election to Trump. At one point Trump also said he hoped Russia would be “able to find” some of Clinton’s files.
