Social media platform X is to shutter its local operations in Brazil following a bitter legal tussle over the platform’s rights and responsibilities, owner Elon Musk said on Saturday.
The service is to remain available to Brazilian users. The closure was the apparent culmination of an ongoing legal battle between Musk and Brazilian Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes, who has said he is trying to fight the spread of dangerous disinformation online.
Moraes had “threatened our legal representative in Brazil with arrest if we do not comply with his censorship orders,” a post from X’s Global Government Affairs Department said on Saturday.
Photo: AFP
It said the office closure was necessary “to protect the safety of our staff.”
“The responsibility lies solely with Alexandre de Moraes,” it added.
The Brazilian government was critical of X’s stance, with Brazilian Secretary of Digital Policies Joao Brant writing on the platform that the company had a “pathetic attitude.”
X would force a “probable escalation that could lead to blocking of the platform,” he added.
Moraes previously had ordered the suspension of several Twitter accounts suspected of spreading disinformation, including those of supporters of former far-right Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, who tried to discredit the voting system in the 2022 presidential election, which he lost.
“Freedom of expression doesn’t mean freedom of aggression,” Moraes has said. “It doesn’t mean the freedom to defend tyranny.”
Musk and other critics have said Moraes is part of a sweeping crackdown on free speech.
Musk said that had X complied with Moraes’s orders, “there was no way we could explain our actions without being ashamed.”
In April, Moraes ordered an investigation of Musk.
An order seen by AFP showed Moraes accusing Musk of “criminal instrumentalization” of the platform.
Musk had reactivated banned accounts, and Moraes said he threatened the billionaire with a fine of about US$20,000 for each instance.
“Social networks are not lands without laws,” Moraes wrote.
Musk responded that while X might lose its Brazilian revenue, “principles matter more than profit.”
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