OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Former President Donald Trump has been really good at predicting things, especially when it comes to how far Big Tech will go to censor him.
This week, the 45th President of the United States appeared on the “Full Send” podcast and, during the show, he predicted that YouTube, which shares the same parent company, Alphabet, as Google, would remove the episode.
The video scored more than 5 million views in less than 24 hours which brought the attention of the company, who has decided that it is its job to be the arbiter of what you are allowed to hear, and was quickly removed.
The podcast shared a message that was sent to it from YouTube which explained why the show was removed and it said, “Content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches changed the outcome of the U.S. 2020 presidential election is not allowed on YouTube.”
Near the end of the conversation with the podcasters, the former president made a prediction that the show would be “punished” for airing the episode.
“Here’s a test — this is a test for everybody. It will be a test for a small group of people. This interview will have millions and millions of people — assuming it’s not touched, let’s see if they allow you, I hate to say this to you cause you guys are going to chicken out, I guarantee it,” he said.
famous last words💀 pic.twitter.com/CEH5sU3lvM
— Parker Merritt (@ParkerMerritt) March 11, 2022
“Don, we don’t chicken out. We don’t chicken out,” one of the hosts said.
“If you put up this whole interview — let’s see what happens when Instagram, and Facebook, and Twitter, and all of them, will take it down. And let’s see what happens when they threaten you,”the former president said. “Because we don’t have a free press in our country.”
“This is the beginning of communism,” he said. “We have a press not so different from countries we don’t want to talk about.”
One of the hosts, Kyle Foregeard, said he and his team were not “afraid of getting hit” by Big Tech.
“Let me tell you where you’ll be scared, when they say, ‘We’re going to take you off the air if you put this up.’ Let’s see all you — people in this room — all you camera geniuses, and tech geniuses, a lot of geniuses, young people,” the former president said as he pointed to people in the room.
“Let’s see what happens when they take it down,” he said.
But Foregeard did not believe that YouTube would really remove the video.
“I don’t think YouTube would take this down. There’s no way,” he said.
On Thursday night Foregeard tweeted, “Youtube has DELETED our trump episode that over 5M views in 24 hours.”
Crazy. pic.twitter.com/ZWlRSbOnZO
— KYLE (@KyleForgeard) March 11, 2022
“This country has fallen apart. Our interview has been deleted after being one of the most popular podcast videos in the history of time. I’m out,” co-host Bob Menery said.
This country has fallen apart. Our interview has been deleted after being one of the most popular podcast videos in the history of time. I’m out pic.twitter.com/dvUk9j9cSl
— Bob Menery (@BobMenery) March 11, 2022
The former president emailed his supporters via his Save America PAC in which he expressed his frustration with YouTube’s decision to remove the show.
“Whatever happened to free speech in our Country? Incredibly, but not surprisingly, the Big Tech lunatics have taken down my interview with the very popular NELK Boys so that nobody can watch it or in any way listen to it,” he said.
The former president then appeared on Fox News with Sean Hannity and spoke about the show being removed.
Trump just shouted us out on live tv pic.twitter.com/un3W08HnwA
— NELK (@nelkboys) March 11, 2022
“This is not a free press,” he said to the host. “Big Tech is a disaster. And our country is a much different place. What they’re doing is really terrible.”
“This was the best show they’ve done, I guess in terms of views,” he said. “And they actually took it down. Really what it is Sean is they’ve taken away the voice of the people, and I don’t think the people will stand for it any longer.”
“This is what they do in Russia. If you look at Russia, Russia doesn’t know, the people in Russia don’t even know they are fighting a war with Ukraine because they have no press. But we don’t have a press, either. We don’t have a press, either, when they can do that,” he argued.
“We had a very good conversation. Four young guys, great people, you know, hot show, Dana White only knows about hot, and this was the best show they have done I guess in terms of views and they actually took it down and really what it is, Sean, they have taken away the voice of the people, and I don’t think that people will stand for it any longer. This is what is happening. This is what happens in other countries, not supposed to happen in this country,” he said.
