Farewell, Catturd? GOP presidential candidate wants ban on anonymous social accounts

By Harold Hutchison
Daily Caller News Foundation

Former ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Tuesday that she favored requiring social media accounts to be verified by a person’s name.

Haley clashed with businessman and fellow Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy over social media multiple times, including a testy exchange during Wednesday’s Republican presidential debate after Ramaswamy mentioned that Haley’s daughter used TikTok. Several popular Twitter accounts, including Catturd and LibsofTikTok are or had been anonymous.

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“Antisemitism was always bubbling underneath the surface but now we’re seeing this massive exaggeration of it, but no one is talking about why,” Haley said during a voter forum on “The Faulkner Focus.” “The truth is, if you look at social media, the misinformation and the dramatic sides of social media are instigating this. It is being pushed by Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.”

“When I get into office, the first thing we have to do, social media companies have to show America their algorithms, let us see why they’re pushing what they’re pushing,” Haley added. “The second thing, every person on social media should be verified by their name. First of all, that’s a national security threat. When you do that, people have to stand by what they say and it gets rid of the Russian bots the Iranian bots and the Chinese bots, and then you’re going to get some civility when people know their name is next to what they say.”

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Haley’s proposal drew pushback on X.

“We can supposedly shut down Iranian bot farms … while also eliminating social media as a tool for opposing repressive regimes worldwide,” Greg Conley posted on the social media site.

“That would be unconstitutional,” Christina Pushaw, a spokesperson for Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, replied.

This story originally was published by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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