Iowa Fourth District Republican Rep. Steve King today showed up on the Washington Post’s list of questionable tweets by members of Congress. But the project that made his activity public was shut down after Twitter withdrew its permission.
Twitter gave the Sunlight Foundation access to deleted tweets by members of Congress and King’s activity caught some attention. The congressman retweeted a message from someone getting on the subway.
“I’m on the kind of metro train where you think to yourself maybe, just maybe, this is the night I get stabbed in the face,” the tweet read.
Seconds later, the tweet disappeared.
The Sunlight Foundation’s Nicko Margulies says Twitter let them see deleted tweets from elected officials only.
”A member of Congress does not have the same expectation of privacy as a citizen,” Margulies says.
But Twitter ended the project in May citing the expectation of privacy for all accounts.
Margulies says King deleted three tweets in all.
“Which is quite low for someone who is outspoken as he is and has a lot of twitter followers,” Margulies says.
The archive is still on the internet. Prolific tweeter Sen. Chuck Grassley shows up a lot, though it appears his deletions were not meant to cover up anything unsavory. Numerous tweets by other Iowa politicians are also on the list, but none appear to be provocative.
Congressman King’s office did not return a call for comment.
The Washington Post today published King's tweet, selected from the Sunlight Foundation’s list of 600 deleted messages by members of Congress.