Media fears Elon Musk taking over Twitter because they don't trust Americans' intelligence, critics say

Some on the left are sounding the alarm about the dire things Elon Musk could do if he purchases Twitter, but the billionaire Tesla mogul insists he simply wants to preserve free speech on the platform.

Free speech advocates are rejoicing, but many liberals resumed their months-long panic about the possible takeover when it was reported Twitter intended to close the deal for Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of the social media company.

"Free speech is an important asset to many people," District Media Group president Beverly Hallberg told Fox News Digital. "Twitter notoriously has been a platform that silences ideas that go against the conventional narrative. We saw this especially during the era of COVID… And so I'm hoping with Elon Musk taking over, it's going to actually turn into a platform where people aren't silenced for having an opinion that's contrary to conventional wisdom."

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Hallberg said too many figures in the media were "fearful" that Americans could decide for themselves without having their hands held on certain subjects, hence the teeth-gnashing over Musk's potential takeover.

"They view themselves as not just there to give information, but be the arbiters of truth, to play disinformation police, to try to censor what information should even be in the lexicon of the American discussion. And so I think what Elon Musk is actually exposing is showing that what many in the media think their responsibility is, is to tell us what we have to think," she said. "But at the end of the day, media don't look to just give facts and information and think that you were smart and wise enough to decide. They think it's dangerous for [people] to decide for themselves."

"Automating Humanity" author Joe Toscano, a key figure in the popular Netflix documentary "The Social Dilemma," which details the negative impact Big Tech can have on people, predicts that Musk will bring a new, unique way of looking at free speech to Twitter. 

"I don't think the left has anything to be worried about, any more than the right, in regard to Elon taking over Twitter," Toscano told Fox News Digital. 

"Everyone can expect that he will definitely remove some of the restrictions, however I think there will also be places where he will become more strict. Perhaps he lowers the threshold, but is stricter in enforcing those thresholds, who knows? I think he will clean up the platform, as we've already seen him attempt to do," Toscano said, adding that even Musk’s critics have to take notice of positive developments surrounding his attempted takeover. 

"Whether you agree with what he's done over the last few months or not, it's unquestionable that he has already improved the transparency on the platform simply by jerking the board and investors around requiring them to disclose things that they never wanted to disclose," Toscano said. "And I think that's great."

Many on the left are worried about the prospects of an "anything goes" platform, where disinformation in their view could run rampant and unchecked. 

The New York Times tech columnist Kevin Roose, in a piece headlined, "Elon Musk’s Twitter Will Be a Wild Ride," made six predictions about Twitter if Musk takes control, including firing CEO Parag Agrawal, "enormous backlash among Twitter’s rank-and-file employees," and killing unpopular features on the platform.

Also, there's the fear of the return of perhaps Twitter's most famous, or infamous, user.

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"[Donald] Trump will return to Twitter, along with a swarm of other right-wing culture warriors," Roose predicted.

"Musk, who has framed his bid for Twitter as an attempt to preserve free speech on the platform, has long said that, if successful, he would allow former President Donald J. Trump to reclaim his Twitter account, which was permanently suspended last year after the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol," Roose wrote. "That will happen almost immediately, I predict."

Roose also fretted that a "host of right-wing culture warriors could come back to the service" and that Musk "has made no secret of his plans to make Twitter a friendlier platform for right-wing voices." Roose also referred to a joke made by the satirical Babylon Bee that got the popular account shunned from Twitter as "transphobic humor."

"Along with one-off reversals of high-profile bans, I’d also expect that Mr. Musk would tear up Twitter’s existing rules and rewrite new ones, and that he might dismantle Twitter’s content-policy and trust-and-safety teams, which are responsible for enforcing the platform’s rules as they currently exist," the Times columnist wrote. "He might even name his own set of free-speech absolutists."

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The Gray Lady’s tech columnist was hardly alone when it came to panicking about the future of Twitter. 

"Every time someone proposes anything to restore free speech, the ‘tolerant’ left goes postal. It's another reason to like Elon Musk," Media Research Center president Brent Bozell told Fox News Digital.  

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was even forced to decline comment when asked if the administration is "concerned" that Musk could take over the social media giant. CNBC panelist Dan Nathan declared he would "probably" quit Twitter if Musk allowed Trump to return to the platform.

"I don’t need to be there for that," Nathan said.

Left-leaning NBC News reporter Ben Collins penned a Twitter thread warning that Musk’s Twitter purchase could affect the 2022 midterm elections.

"For those of you asking: Yes, I do think this site can and will change pretty dramatically if Musk gets full control over it. No, there is no immediate replacement. If it gets done early enough, based on the people he's aligned with, yes, it could actually affect midterms," Collins wrote, adding the "guardrails" and "oversight" would be gone, and authoritarian governments would flourish.

Collins’ message was retweeted by left-wing figures like MSNBC host Joy Reid and New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen. NPR editor Neela Banerjee also shared the thread writing, "As usual, Ben Collins provides a useful thread on the broader implications for the rest of us of a Musk takeover of Twitter."

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Grabien Media founder Tom Elliott believes "the worse the journalist, the more ardently they'll insist we need ‘guardrails’ on allowable discourse" and backlash to Musk’s potential Twitter takeover is exposing members of the media. 

"If ordinary people are allowed to freely exchange information, it's very easy to hold the press accountable. That we need to maintain a large system of censorship to protect the masses from misinformation is actually the worst misinformation of all," Elliott told Fox News Digital. 

"NBC's Ben Collins even [appeared to admit] Democrats might lose the midterms if Twitter can't keep censoring conservatives," Elliott continued. "Don't let these people lie to you – our freedom depends on our ability to exchange ideas without restriction. Free people and free speech are mutually dependent."

Mainstream media pundits initially voiced their displeasure at the Twitter purchase in April when the potential deal was first announced, but the prospective takeover was delayed as Musk challenged the number of bogus accounts active on the platform. Now that the deal appears likely to happen, Musk's critics have come out in full force. 

"These guys are the most delusional people on the planet. Musk is not ‘for free speech.’ And Twitter *favors* right-wing content and accounts. The fact that this ‘Twitter has an anti-conservative bias’ crap is so widely believed on the right is insane," liberal writer Parker Molloy tweeted.

Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Imran Ahmed wrote, "Elon Musk has consistently failed to understand the inevitable consequences of his sophomoric slogan that Twitter would be better if users had more ‘free speech.’"

Former Politico Magazine editor Garrett M. Graff wrote, "Be afraid, be actually afraid." 

Political satirist Tim Young, whose Twitter account has nearly 650,000 followers, has used social media to advance his career by regularly mocking liberal ideology. He believes "the left knows that their ideas don't hold up, especially in a free market where people can freely discuss what’s happening in the world," so objecting to Musk’s potential Twitter takeover shouldn’t surprise anyone. 

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"They took the fascistic turn to restrict speech and silence their opposition over the past five years, but Elon Musk is a direct threat to the far-left losing complete control of the narrative due to the mere sharing of ideas and facts – that's why they're opposed to him," Young told Fox News Digital. 

"The left should be concerned about free speech taking away their power," he continued. "But in that statement, that free speech takes away their power, you see the very problem of the modern left."

Besides the blocking of the New York Post Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, perhaps Twitter's most stunning move in recent years was permanently banishing the former president from the platform. The initial suspension was widely applauded in the media, but even some of Trump's sharpest critics, like former Republican congressman Joe Walsh, think it was the wrong decision.

"I'm not a huge fan of his, but if Elon Musk takes over Twitter, then Twitter is his, and he can have whatever rules he wants to have," Walsh told Fox News Digital. "I think it was wrong for Twitter to get rid of Trump… I think Twitter generally is a little too anti-speech for me. It's their private company… But there's no doubt that Trump should have an account if the ruling Mullah in Iran has an account."

The Poynter Institute and Columbia Journalism Review, both considered media industry leaders, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

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Fox News’ Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.