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--:-- John Bickley: A very public free speech showdown over Twitter's censorship of Daily Wire's hit documentary, What is a Woman? Last night, resulted in chaos online and the resignation of a top Twitter official. How is the film's star, Matt Walsh, responded? And what does Elon Musk say is going to happen next? I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Friday, June 2nd, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: With Ron DeSantis now officially in the race, the battle between the Florida governor and former President Donald Trump is ratcheting up. Rob DeSantis and his poll numbers are dropping like a rock. Hell, his whole family moved to Florida under my governorship. Are you kidding me? How are the candidates' campaigns handling the high-stakes attack game differently, and which other high-profile names are poised to jump in the race?
--:-- John Bickley: And in a landmark win for the free speech movement, a major state medical school has disbanded its DEI task force, citing concerns about compelled political speech. They pledged to teach their medical students about, quote-unquote, unconscious bias and how America's medical system is systemically racist. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Georgia Howe: In a surprise move on Thursday, Twitter restricted the launch of the hit documentary What is a Woman, starring Matt Walsh and produced by Morning Wire's parent company, The Daily Wire. The moment pitted Elon Musk's professed commitment to free speech against his own platform's restrictive policies. The platform had struck a deal with the media company to air the film for free on its one-year anniversary, which would have included a landing page in wide reach, but backed out due to what it claimed were two instances of misgendering.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, according to Boring, after the Daily Wire signed the agreement, Twitter asked to see the film so they could prepare a response to any potential criticism. But then after reviewing it, they said that they were not only canceling the agreement, they were actually going to significantly limit the film's reach and also put a hateful conduct label on it because of quote unquote misgendering.
--:-- John Bickley: Now, the two instances that Twitter's referring to there were when a father referred to his own 14-year-old daughter as her. And then later in a confrontation with a trans person, a store owner uses a pronoun that matches the person's biological sex.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, Boring, Walsh, Ben Shapiro, Babylon Bee CEO, Seth Dillon, and a number of other high-profile accounts on Twitter asked Musk for an explanation, given that he has made a lot of promises that Twitter would be the free speech platform.
--:-- John Bickley: Right now, what did he say when he weighed in? Well, he said it was a mistake by quote many people at Twitter and he assured Boring that the so misgendering was definitely allowed. He did add that because of advertiser issues, the film would still be somewhat limited, but he made it clear that he felt it did not violate Twitter's rules.
--:-- Megan Basham: So when Musk said it was a mistake for the company to restrict the film, I think we all assumed that it was resolved and that it would air as originally planned. But then it didn't. So is that another mistake? You know, it's still a little unclear how much mistakes or maybe just insubordination might have been at play here.
--:-- John Bickley: When the film launched, it was as if the platform stuck with their original plan to censor it. Twitter users couldn't share it. The link was deliberately difficult to find. I tried for a while and the reach was severely limited. Labels were attached to it saying that it violated Twitter's rules for hateful conduct. And it appears that maybe some Twitter employees were acting against Musk's explicit directives.
--:-- Megan Basham: So the head of Twitter's trust and safety department, the department that appears to have been responsible for that label being applied, abruptly resigned from the company on Thursday evening. And we do know now that another employee is out too. It sounds like there may have been more than that, but that's not yet confirmed.
--:-- John Bickley: And then late Thursday evening, Musk said that Twitter would be updating the system so that Daily Wire followers would be able to see the film in their feed, but it wouldn't be recommended to non-followers, and it wouldn't have advertising associated with it. But Twitter users would be able to share it and comment on it. He cited its sensitive content, which prompted some fierce pushback from Daily Wire host Candace Owens, who asked what specifically is sensitive about a two-hour documentary that asks people what is a woman.
--:-- Megan Basham: People are sensitive. The content itself is not.
--:-- John Bickley: So currently, are Twitter users able to view and share the film? Yes, users should be able to view the film for free on Twitter. I was able to share the film on my Twitter account late last night, and I was also able to play it on Daily Wire's main Twitter page.
--:-- Megan Basham: All right. Now, what about Matt Walsh? He's the star of the documentary. What has he said about the whole debacle?
--:-- John Bickley: Yeah, he was very vocal about it throughout the day. He challenged Musk to follow through on his commitment to free speech on the platform. And he also demanded some explanations for the platform's treatment of his film.
--:-- Megan Basham: After the film went live, he also noted that despite the restrictions, it was still drawing a lot of viewers. Even with all that throttling, he noted the film managed to rack up a million views in the first three hours. So a pretty impressive launch.
--:-- John Bickley: Right, turned out to be a heck of an advertising campaign for him. Yeah, in fact, I think Musk himself said the Streisand effect on this is gonna set an all-time record.
--:-- Megan Basham: All right, well, thanks for reporting.
--:-- John Bickley: Anytime.
--:-- Georgia Howe: As the GOP presidential primary moves into full swing, with more candidates set to announce, the stakes are rising and the rhetoric is heating up. We're starting to see a war of words, not only from Donald Trump, who has been on offense for months now, but also from the newer candidates, most notably Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
--:-- David Marcus: Hi, Dave. So DeSantis has somewhat slowly begun to attack Trump. How hard is he going?
--:-- John Bickley: Morning. It's a bit mixed. The Senate has begun to take some shots at Trump. For example, when he says the GOP needs to get past the culture of losing right, that really means Trump losing in 2020 and his lackluster slate of 2022 Senate candidates.
--:-- David Marcus: Right. He also talked about Trump's failure to fire or at least rein in Dr. Anthony Fauci during the COVID lockdowns. He's also called Trump's taunting attacks juvenile and promised not to get dragged into the mud.
--:-- John Bickley: But he has to be careful because he needs votes from people who like Trump in order to win the primary. And if he does win, he needs Trump supporters in the general election. So it's a very narrow needle that he has to thread here.
--:-- David Marcus: Yeah, complicated campaign, no doubt.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, Trump appears to have fewer calculations in attacking DeSantis. How hard is the former president punching of late?
--:-- David Marcus: It's really a scattershot of various attacks almost every day. On Thursday, he launched a new one, mocking DeSantis for boasting that he can serve eight years when Trump can only serve four. Trump says it will only take him six months to make things the way it is, mocking DeSantis for needing eight years.
--:-- John Bickley: That shows a classic agility in Trump's insults. But for months, he's been all over the map, that DeSantis supposedly locked down Florida, that he's not ready, arguing that he supported gutting Social Security in Congress.
--:-- David Marcus: So it's kind of nonstop. And in fairness, the claims in Trump's attacks are on a sliding scale of credulity.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. Team DeSantis has had a field day fact-checking some of Trump's attacks.
--:-- David Marcus: Yeah. It seems like Trump and DeSantis have very different styles of political offense. Can we tell yet whose attacks are landing and doing more damage?
--:-- John Bickley: I think it's hard to tell. Obviously, Trump has seen a boom in the polls in recent months, stretching his lead above 30 points. But it's hard to know how much of that was owing to attacks on DeSantis, though, look, a lot of money was spent in ads meant to define DeSantis in voters' eyes.
--:-- David Marcus: Now that he's officially in the race, the governor's making his direct appeal and working hard to define himself, that's a key dynamic. Everyone knows exactly who and what Trump is and that he won't change. Who and what voters decide Ron DeSantis is is the thing that can turn the tide here.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right. Now, at least two more Republicans are announcing their run for the White House. That's former Vice President Mike Pence, who's not known as a brawler, but former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie certainly is. Is he going to train his fire on Trump?
--:-- David Marcus: Certainly some, if not most of it on Trump. Yeah, he, along with Asa Hutchinson, are really the only people running who flat out say that Trump is unfit for office. He's not trying to triangulate between Trump supporters and Trump skeptical Republican voters.
--:-- John Bickley: And so I think we will see much more direct attacks on Trump than DeSantis is really in a position to employ at this point.
--:-- David Marcus: That having been said, this is the same Chris Christie who torpedoed, quote, robot Rubio's 2016 campaign in a famous moment in a New Hampshire debate.
--:-- Georgia Howe: I spoke to Christie the next day. I asked him about that and he just smiled and he said, that was fun. Might he want to have some fun at the expense of DeSantis? He might. And part of that might focus on DeSantis's lighter touch in regard to criticizing Trump and his record as president.
--:-- David Marcus: Well, a bunch of campaign events being announced. So we'll be hearing a lot more from all of these candidates and seeing which angles they take.
--:-- John Bickley: Dave, thanks for joining us.
--:-- David Marcus: Thanks for having me.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Free speech activists have secured a notable win in North Carolina as UNC Chapel Hill Medical School announced that it's disbanding its DEI task force.
--:-- John Bickley: Georgia, you've been following the story. Why is this university, where I went to grad school, by the way, why is it stepping away from DEI?
--:-- Georgia Howe: This is actually just the latest step UNC has taken Over the course of 2023 UNC has increasingly distanced itself from a variety of DEI elements starting 1st in February when the university board of governors voted to ban DEI statements in admissions and hiring.
--:-- John Bickley: So regular listeners might remember we ran a segment about that on March 11th. Now they've gone ahead and disbanded the entire DEI task force. I vaguely remember that. So that's obviously, you know, a big change.
--:-- Georgia Howe: What prompted it? Well, UNC has been the target of a very successful free speech campaign by two organizations, Color Us United, which is a group that lobbies for a race-blind society, and the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, otherwise known as FIRE, which is a free speech organization.
--:-- John Bickley: Now, back in January, the group Color Us United ran a very public campaign calling on the university's medical school to rescind its DEI policies, which included course materials and requirements for students and staff that the group considered to be racially divisive.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, for example, they zeroed in on course material that required students to affirm that America's medical system is, quote, structurally racist.
--:-- John Bickley: And at the time, the university deflected somewhat. They said that many of these DEI recommendations actually came from the Association of American Medical Colleges, which is the accreditation body. And that organization requires a variety of DEI courses for schools to get their accreditation.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So, for example, the AAMC requires students to study, quote, unconscious bias, as well as microaggressions. This is all considered part of the standard medical degree coursework.
--:-- John Bickley: Now, the university said it created a DEI task force in 2019 to ensure compliance and alignment with those AAMC requirements. But their stance on all this has begun to shift recently.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Right, it really did, and it was very fast, actually.
--:-- John Bickley: So as a result of that campaign from Color Us United in February, UNC's board of governors went on to vote to ban diversity, equity and inclusion statements for admissions, hiring and promotion.
--:-- Georgia Howe: They ultimately decided that those statements, which basically require applicants to affirm certain diversity principles, which some people consider to be opinions, were tantamount to compelled speech and specifically compelled political speech.
--:-- John Bickley: But then in mid-May, the university actually went a step further. They put out a statement saying that they were disbanding the DEI task force altogether and that they weren't planning on implementing any of the planks in the plan that they had come up with up to that point.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right, so none of the recommendations from this group. What drove this? What was the impetus for that announcement in May?
--:-- John Bickley: Well, the announcement in May was actually a direct response to a letter that the university received from FIRE concerning their DEI policies.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So in early April, FIRE reached out to UNC with concerns about their proposed DEI framework. And in response, the university put out a statement.
--:-- John Bickley: Now, that statement was a full page, but I'll just read the most interesting part. They said, quote, There is no plan to implement the task force's recommendations now or in the future. Even if the recommendations were revisited in the future, further review and revision would be required.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Now, the university also said that it values its green rating from FIRE and that it's committed to, quote, protecting individual free expression and academic freedom.
--:-- John Bickley: So overall, a rare but decisive win for the free speech movement. And a good case study for the kinds of campaigns that are effective.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Georgia, thanks for reporting.
--:-- John Bickley: It's always fun.
--:-- John Bickley: That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.
