There's a phenomenon on the internet called the "Streisand Effect," whereby a person's attempt to suppress information ends up widely publicizing that very same information. It was named after a 2003 incident when Barbra Streisand tried to keep images of her Malibu mansion off the web and inadvertently drew massive amounts of attention to it. And it's why Devin Nunes' mom was trending on Twitter Tuesday morning.
Nunes, the Republican congressman from California, said he was filing a lawsuit against Twitter and three specific Twitter users, seeking $250 million in damages. Nunes argues that the users defamed him and that Twitter “knowingly acted as a vessel for opposition research" and allowed defamatory statements against prominent conservatives to spread.
Two of the users named in the suit, which has not been yet been filed but was obtained by some news outlets, go by the usernames "Devin Nunes' Mom" and "Devin Nunes Cow." The former account was suspended, while the latter has spent the last two years calling Nunes names like "udder-ly worthless" and a "treasonous cowpoke."
The cow had about 1,200 followers before the lawsuit made headlines. It now counts 89,000 followers as of midday Tuesday.
Speaking to Fox News Monday night, Nunes called those accounts part of an "orchestrated effort" to target him for his allegiance to President Trump and his investigation, as the former chair of the House Intelligence Committee, into Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign. He called the suit "the first of many."
The lawsuit seeks to tie those obvious parody accounts to a larger issue that has become a grievance among some conservatives on Twitter, in which they claim that the social network actively censors their tweets through "shadow banning" their accounts to make them harder to find. Twitter has denied those allegations.
As a public official, Nunes' lawsuit would have to show "actual malice," the standard set by the landmark Supreme Court case NY Times v. Sullivan to prove libel against public figures. Hyperbole and satire are generally protected as free speech, and similar lawsuits have failed in the courts. The Sullivan decision recently generated headlines when conservative Justice Clarence Thomas publicly called for it to be reconsidered.
While Nunes' lawsuit may seem doomed legally, it did have the effect, unintended or not, of gaining him publicity, which has in the past burnished conservatives' reputations in the eyes of their boss.
Two years ago, Nunes seemed to have a different perspective on litigation: he was a co-sponsor of the "Discouraging Frivolous Lawsuits Act."
House Democrats are scrambling to hold a vote as soon as Tuesday on President Joe Biden's economic agenda — both the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill and the $1.85 trillion social safety net and climate bill. With Biden still overseas, the bill stands in flux. Jennifer Haberkorn, congressional reporter at the Los Angeles Times, joined Cheddar's "Opening Bell" to discuss.
Lauren Brody, author of "The Fifth Trimester," joined Cheddar to talk about the ongoing fight for a national paid family leave policy after it was cut from the Democratic reconciliation bill negotiation reportedly due to objections from Senator Manchin. Brody discussed how parents are often forced to choose between work and caring for their family and newborns — or even taking time to deal with a traumatic loss. "Frankly, it's appalling to me that we live in a place that doesn't support people who have experienced the death of a baby and then had to go right back to work," she noted.
Even with pandemic lockdowns, greenhouse gas levels reached new highs in 2020, according to the World Meteorological Organization. This report comes just a week ahead of the United Nations Climate Change Conference, otherwise known as Cop26. Shannon Osaka, climate policy and solutions reporter at Grist, joined Cheddar's Between Bells to discuss.
Paid family & medical leave is left out of President Joe Biden's Build Back Better domestic policy plan. Abby Vesoulis, reporter for TIME joins Cheddar News to breakdown what this means for Americans.
Carlo's flying solo today, talking COP26 and climate change, another racially charged trial gets underway, SCOTUS takes on abortion and a stunning rise in traffic deaths points to a bigger societal breakdown sparked by the pandemic.
World leaders will converge this weekend at the 2021 G20 Summit in Rome and the UN COP26 conference in Glasgow with the climate crisis on the agenda. Lord Adair Turner, chair of the Energy Transitions Commission, joined Cheddar to discuss what people can expect to come out of the climate-focused conferences. Turner also noted that one of the biggest hurdles for the attending nations will be coming to a uniform decision on expanding on the Paris Climate Accord goals that have become insufficient to prevent global warming by 1.5 degrees celsius.
Emily Tisch Sussman, senior advisor at Paid Leave US, joined Cheddar's "Between Bells" to discuss paid leave being stripped from the latest budget bill and why it is crucial for parents to have paid time off. Sussman said the pandemic, in particular, highlighted the disparity between women, who left the work force in droves to care for family, and men who continue to work and be rehired as impacted sectors of the economy return.
The Dow, S&P, and Nasdaq each ended Friday's session at a record high as stocks rallied into the green. Chris Vecchio, Senior Analyst at DailyFX, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell, where he says this was an 'October to remember' for Wall Street.
