New Twitter CEO’s comments on first Amendment rights

Twitters CEO Jack Dorsey is stepping down and Parag Agrawal will take over the company. Parag Agrawal was raised in India. He graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay before coming to the US.

In a 2020 interview Parag Agrawal said, “Our role is not to be bound by the First Amendment.”

His words come as a shock since he will be spearheading one of the biggest speech platforms in world. While many of us want to stay with the times in many ways, no American should ever want to lose or say they are not bound by the very Amendment that gives people in this country the freedom to express their ideas, practice their religion, or assemble. Yet one of the most powerful tech firms incoming CEO says he doesn’t want to be bound by the very law that is the basis upon which platforms like theirs is able to operate.

In 2010, Agrawal quoted a comedian mocking racism and Islamophobia in America.

“If they are not gonna make a distinction between Muslims and extremists, then why should I distinguish between white people and racists,” Agrawal said in the tweet posted on October 26, 2010.

The question could be asked “If Twitter will not honor the laws of this country, then what does it honor?”