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A foreign minister who served under former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called on the Biden administration to condemn his country’s ban on social media platform X, saying the U.S. has a ‘responsibility’ to speak up.
Ernesto Araújo, who served as foreign minister under Bolsonaro from 2019 to 2021, said the U.S. has a ‘responsibility to be the reference point for democracy, for rule of law, for freedom in the hemisphere.’ But the White House has been silent for too long, he said, and it’s hesitation to advocate for free speech predates the ban on X, he said.
“The Biden administration is not living up to that – have not lived up to that for a long time – and about what is happening in Brazil, because the banning of X is not something out of the blue,” Araújo told Fox News Digital. “It’s one more step, after many steps, of curtailing basic rights and destroying the rule of law, destroying democracy in Brazil, something perpetrated by the Supreme Court, by a good portion of the political class, and the administration never did anything.”
ELON MUSK GETS SURPRISING DEFENDER AFTER X WAS BANNED IN BRAZIL: THE WASHINGTON POST
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes last week banned X after the company failed to appoint a legal representative in the country, leading to the “immediate, complete and total suspension of X’s operations” in Brazil.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Ernesto Araújo offers a press conference at Itamaraty Palace in Brasilia on March 2, 2021. (Evaristo Sa/AFP via Getty Images)
The ban will remain in place “until all court orders . . . are complied with, fines are duly paid and a new legal representative for the company is appointed in the country,” according to The Guardian.
X, under outspoken owner Elon Musk, has refused to comply following Moraes’s order to ban several accounts related to individuals involved in an alleged attempted coup last year. The powerful judge alleged that these accounts have spread…
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