As Elon Musk Acquires Twitter, List Of Banned Accounts He Could Restore

Having closed his $44 billion acquisition deal to buy Twitter, Elon Musk has already made his first moves beginning with the termination of the company's top executives including CEO Parag Agrawal. The billionaire, on several occasions in the past, has highlighted the importance of free speech and his desire to make the platform more inclusive.

Over the years, Twitter has suspended the accounts of a number of users citing violations of its terms and conditions. These include some influential names such as former President of the United States Donald Trump and his ally and lobbyist Roger Stone. Now that the Tesla CEO has become the owner of Twitter, it is speculated that he might lift the ban on such accounts.

Below is the list of some of the biggest names whose Twitter accounts have been suspended on account of violating various policies of the platform.

Donald Trump

The former president of the United States was permanently banned from Twitter on January 8, 2021, two days after the US Capitol riot. Twitter stated that Mr Trump's account was suspended “due to the risk of further incitement of violence” caused by his tweets.”

Steve Banon

Twitter suspended the account of Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist, in November 2020 after he suggested in a video posted online that the White House chief medical advisor Dr Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray should be beheaded. The platform stated that Mr Bannon violated its “policy on the glorification of violence”.

Martin Shkreli

Martin Shkreli, former drug executive and hedge fund manager had his Twitter account permanently banned in January 2017 for harassing journalist Lauren Duca in a direct text message. He had announced the suspension of his account on Facebook.

Alex Jones

Twitter banned the account of far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in September 2018. The Twitter account of his website Infowars was also permanently suspended for violating Twitter's abusive and behaviour policy.

Roger Stone

An ally of former US president Donald Trump, Roger Stone had his Twitter account permanently banned in 2017 for his threatening against CNN anchors. He later joined the platform after creating another account this year which was also shortly banned for violating Twitter rules.

Aubrey Huff

Former American professional baseball player Aubrey Huff was banned from Twitter in August 2021 for violation of Twitter rules. Mr Huff confirmed in a now-deleted Instagram post that his account on the microblogging platform has been suspended.