Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., demanded Elon Musk "restore" her account after it was restricted on Tuesday.
Greene and other right-wingers launched anti-trans attacks after a shooter that police said was transgender killed six people, including three children, at the Covenant School, a private Christian school in Nashville. The far-right has since seized on reports from Fox News and other outlets that trans activists are planning a "TransDay of Vengeance" on April 1, an event that was apparently promoted before the Nashville attack.
The event appears to have been promoted by Our Rights DC, a group that has a little more than 1,000 followers on Twitter, according to The Hill. "The Trans Day of Vengeance event about which Greene shared information is a spin on Trans Day of Visibility, which takes place on March 31 every year, and is being planned by Trans Radical Activist Network (TRAN), a new trans-led nationwide activist movement," according to the LGBTQ+ rights outlet Them. TRAN disavowed the event, stressing that "we don't encourage violence."
Greene on Twitter baselessly claimed that "antifa" was organizing the alleged event. Greene repeatedly reposted a purported poster for the event while complaining about Twitter's actions to remove it. She said her account was ultimately suspended.
Ella Irwin, Twitter's head of trust and safety, wrote that the company removed more than 5,000 tweets that included a poster for the alleged event.
"We do not support tweets that incite violence irrespective of who posts them," Irwin wrote. "'Vengeance' does not imply peaceful protest. Organizing or support for peaceful protests is ok."
Irwin added that the company did not impose strikes against accounts that shared the poster.
"We just restricted the media being shared," Irwin wrote. "There is no impact to users for having tweeted it unless it is reposted after removal or was posted with additional calls for violence/ wishes of harm."
But Greene lashed out on her personal account, accusing Twitter of whitewashing the "threat of Antifa driven trans-terrorism."
"This is a lie," Greene wrote of the claim that her account had not been impacted.
"My Congressional account was suspended for 7 days for exposing Antifa, who are organizing a call for violence called 'Trans Day of Vengeance.' The day after the mass murder of children by a trans shooter. Restore my account immediately," Greene demanded, tagging Irwin and Twitter owner Elon Musk.
This is a lie.
— Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 (@mtgreenee) March 28, 2023
My Congressional account was suspended for 7 days for exposing Antifa, who are organizing a call for violence called “Trans Day of Vengeance.”
The day after the mass murder of children by a trans shooter.
Restore my account immediately. @elonmusk @ellagirwin… https://t.co/p9XZLtuuDF pic.twitter.com/svViCYUyhm
Greene's claims come after she faced backlash for stoking anti-trans rhetoric in the wake of the Nashville shooting.
"How much hormones like testosterone and medications for mental illness was the transgender Nashville school shooter taking? Everyone can stop blaming guns now," Greene tweeted on Monday.
Critics trashed Greene's comment, noting that 98% of mass shootings are committed by men and there is no evidence linking hormones to violent behavior. Trans people are four times more likely to be victims of violent crime, according to a study by UCLA's Williams Institute.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., slammed Greene's "absolutely disgusting" comments.
"She should be looking into a mirror as to why she's defending and posing with the same weapons that are being used to kill children, teachers and educators," Ocasio-Cortez told The Independent.
A growing number of right-wingers have used the Nashville shooting to stoke anti-trans sentiment. Donald Trump Jr. baselessly alleged on Monday that there is an "epidemic of trans/non-binary mass shooters."
Shannon Watts, the founder of the gun safety group Moms Demand Action, told NBC News that it seems "the list of what gun extremists have blamed for mass shootings keeps growing: violent video games, mental health, not enough doors, too many doors, and now gender identity."
"What they don't want to talk about is that only in America is a shooter able to get their hands on the assault weapons — one equipped with an arm brace — that were used to commit this atrocity," she said.
"Every study available shows that transgender and non-binary people are much more likely to be victims of violence, rather than the perpetrator of it," the Human Rights Campaign said in a statement following the shooting. "Regardless of the reason for this shooting, the use of violence is reprehensible and we renew our call for common-sense gun safety."
