'Bowing down to a dictatorship': Turkish-American NBA star shreds Elon Musk over Twitter censorship

15 May 2023

Activist and former Turkish-American National Basketball Association center tore into Twitter owner Elon Musk on Monday for granting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's demand to suspend user profiles that he deemed inappropriate ahead of the country's presidential election.

The authoritarian Erdoğan, who has been in power for two decades, "failed to secure 50% of votes cast" and will face his opponent Kemal Kilicdaroglu in a runoff contest on May 28th, CNN noted.

Per Vanity Fair, "Twitter didn't say which accounts it had restricted, but Turkish Minute, a Turkish news site, reported that the censored accounts included Kurdish businessman Muhammed Yakut, who has claimed that Erdogan and his allies staged a 2016 coup attempt, and investigative journalist Cevheri Güven, who reports on corruption in the country. 'It's a disgrace to democracy and freedom of expression that Twitter has caved to Tayyip Erdoğan,' Güven told Turkish Minute."

READ MORE: Elon Musk has a new hostage

Musk defended his decision, tweeting on Saturday that his choices were to have "Twitter throttled in its entirety" or to "limit access to some tweets."

Freedom, meanwhile, is all too familiar with Erdoğan's totalitarian tactics. In January, Turkish Minute reported that Erdoğan placed a $500,000 bounty on Freedom's head.

"Freedom, who has not had a team to play for since 2022, reportedly for speaking out against human rights abuses around the world, spoke to Turkish Minute about his inclusion on the Turkish Interior Ministry's 'Terrorist Wanted List,' which offers a reward of up to TL 10 million for information that leads to the capture of the wanted person," the outlet explained, "noting that many journalists and other athletes" have also been targeted by Erdoğan.

"According to UN special rapporteurs," Turkish Minute added, "the vague and imprecise charge of 'membership in an armed terrorist organization' appears to be repeatedly misused to target critics of the Turkish government’s policies."

Indeed, Freedom is far from alone. "There are so many innocent journalists, academics, athletes, activists, and educators on this list. Now their lives are in danger because of the Turkish government," he told Turkish Minute.

Thus, there is little mystery behind what he expressed to CNN on Monday about Musk's cooperation with Erdoğan, which Freedom views not as merely dangerous but downright hypocritical.

"I wanna also ask you about Elon Musk because Twitter said that it was going to restrict some access before Turkey's election took place. This was in the days before the voting started. Elon Musk defended it online and basically, obviously, as you know, much of Turkey's media is under government control. What do you make of Elon Musk defending, limiting access to Twitter ahead of the, this election?" anchor Kaitlan Collins asked.

"You know, I don't want to hear about Elon Musk talking about free speech ever again. He's literally bowing down to a dictatorship. You know, [the] Turkish government called Elon to pretty much, tell him to... if you don't ban [a] couple [of] accounts that we are going to shut down the whole app in Turkey," Freedom said.

Musk, he further charged, "picked business and money over his morals and principles. So I don't want to hear about him talking about free speech ever again."

Watch below or at this link.

CNN's report continues here. Vanity Fair's is here. Turkish Minute's is here.

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