Twitter on Wednesday banned a high-profile alt-right troll, marking the latest step in the social network's efforts to crack down on hateful and abusive speech.
The account belonging to 29-year-old Tim Gionet, widely known by his Twitter handle @BakedAlaska, was permanently suspended. When asked about the suspension, a spokesperson for Twitter cited the company's practice of not commenting on individual accounts and referred BuzzFeed News to it's
hateful conduct policy.
The policy prohibits "repeated and/or or non-consensual slurs, epithets, racist and sexist tropes, or other content that degrades someone."
It was not immediately clear what specifically prompted the suspension, and Gionet (who previously worked at BuzzFeed) did not respond to a Facebook message seeking comment. A
cached version of the account indicated he had most recently tweeted on Monday to his 193,000 followers.
However, the suspension comes amid significant criticism of Twitter's handling of extremist voices, and after the company has
taken steps to more rigorously control hate speech on the platform. The most recent salvo came Wednesday, when Twitter
acknowledged that its verified status — which is indicated by a blue checkmark — "has long been perceived as an endorsement," and
announced a new verification policy. Under the
new policy, accounts can lose their verified status for "intentionally misleading people" and "promoting hate and/or violence."
