Over the weekend, Twitter owner Elon Musk teased future Twitter Files covering the platform's handling of COVID-19 related censorship.
"Twitter is both a social media company and a crime scene," Musk said Saturday, appearing to reference recent Twitter Files reporting from journalist Matt Taibbi and former New York Times editor Bari Weiss revealing the platform had previously colluded with the Biden team and other government figures censoring unfavorable content.
Shortly after, the tech billionaire shared a meme featuring a cartoon character labeled "Elon" holding a shovel next to a gravestone reading "Twitter's darkest secrets."
On Sunday, Musk shared a doctored meme featuring Dr. Anthony Fauci as Lord of the Rings character Gríma Wormtongue whispering "just one more lockdown my king" to President Joe Biden.
The meme criticized the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) director, suggesting Fauci played a larger role in COVID-19 lockdown measures — a claim which Biden's chief medical advisor has denied.
"When will we get the Twitter Files on covid?" asked one user. "The info on the suspension of the many doctors and scientists? Who was involved? Suppression of what has turned out to be factual information.”
"Oh it is coming bigtime..." Musk responded shortly after.
Musk followed up what appeared to be his criticism of Fauci and the lockdown measures of COVID-19 by saying "my pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci."
Georgia House representative Marjorie Taylor Greene responded, "I affirm your pronouns Elon."
"Elon, please don’t mock and promote hate toward already marginalized and at-risk-of-violence members of the #LGBTQ+ community," said Former Nasa Astronoaut Scott Kelly. "They are real people with real feelings. Furthermore, Dr Fauci is a dedicated public servant whose sole motivation was saving lives."
"I strongly disagree. Forcing your pronouns upon others when they didn’t ask, and implicitly ostracizing those who don’t, is neither good nor kind to anyone," Musk said rebutting Kelly's criticism. "As for Fauci, he lied to Congress and funded gain-of-function research that killed millions of people. Not awesome imo."
"Elon Musk wants to criminalize Anthony Fauci because he disagrees with him," said New York Congressman Ritchie Torres echoing Kelly's sentiment.
"In the warped mind of Elon Musk, a pronoun is more dangerous than a politicized prosecution against Dr. Fauci," Torres continued in a separate post.
"Pretty sure [Elon Musk] wants to 'criminalize' Fauci because Fauci lied under oath, engaged in gain of function research in a Chinese lab, jeopardized the entire planet, and arguably contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. But nice strawman, [Ritchie Torres]," said Canadian lawyer Viva Frei.
"Correct," Musk responded.
The tech billionaire further confirmed COVID-19 would be covered in a future Twitter Files report.
On Monday morning, Musk addressed pushback over his criticism of Fauci jokingly saying "the Branch Covidians are upset lol."
Over the weekend, two more installments of the Twitter Files were released by Taibbi and author Michael Shellenberger covering Twitter's decision to remove former President Donald Trump from the platform. Former Twitter head of trust and safety Yoel Roth was also revealed to have participated in meetings with the FBI discussing censorship of the former President.
