Ohio political blog "The Rooster" was banned from X after making a post calling for U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to be thrown in prison for life.
D.J. Byrnes, the blog's main author, said he made the post over the weekend after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents shot and killed a second person, Alex Pretti, in Minneapolis. The post responded to a report that DHS would be investigating the shooting itself.
Byrnes said Noem "will have to die in prison. No other way around it."
Byrnes replied with another post saying the same should happen to DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin and her husband Ben Yoho, both of whom Byrnes said have Ohio roots. The post included McLaughlin and Yoho's photos inside the same wanted poster's ICE uses for immigrants the agency is trying to arrest.
Byrnes said he was alerted earlier this week that his account was suspended. The two posts were tagged by X with messages saying Byrnes violated policies prohibiting violent speech and abuse.
Byrnes said he meant that Noem should be prosecuted after Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents shot and killed two people in Minneapolis and spend the rest of her natural life in prison. Other officials, like Ohio U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty, are calling on Noem to be removed or impeached.
"In my opinion, it wasn't a call to violence or anything like that. Just the standard, she deserves to be prosecuted for her.... what I consider corruption," Byrnes said.
DHS officials didn't respond to a request for comment.
Byrnes said he may make a new account, but most of his web traffic doesn't come from X, which is owned by billionaire Elon Musk.
"It's largely a dying website that's propped up by bots. But the secret to Twitter is it's about principle to me. Like, I'm not just going to let the richest man in the world and anonymous Nazis drive me off the sentence website where I've been posting for 17 years," Byrnes said.
The Rooster runs its blog on Substack, but it also uses other social media sites like Instagram. The left-leaning blog has a history of criticizing both state Republicans and local Democrats in Columbus.
Recently, Byrnes has broken news before traditional media outlets about Columbus City Councilmember Tiara Ross' unpaid parking tickets and how Ohio Governor candidate Vivek Ramaswamy's security team wasn't licensed with the state after one of its employees was arrested for drug trafficking.
Byrnes said part of his brand is "inflicting psychic damage on Republicans." He said he makes edgier social media posts, like the one about Noem, to attract readers to his blog on paid posts.
"What I was saying is she deserved to be prosecuted and spend the rest of her natural life in prison, which is a routine type of sentence handed out every day in America," Byrnes said.
Byrnes said he gets reported a lot on X by people who he said disagree with him. He said he suspects bots and A.I. on X also play a role.
He said he got a death threat from an account after he made a blog post about the alleged fraud at Somali-American owned daycares in Columbus. Byrnes criticized the conservative social media influencers who made those claims.
Byrnes said he's been reprimanded on social media in the past. In 2020, Byrnes said he made a post joking that he worked as a poll worker during the election and threw out 20,000 ballots that voted for Trump. Byrnes didn't work as a poll worker that year.
He also said Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose threatened to launch an investigation into him. After that, Byrnes said he posted that LaRose should come visit him in the Hilltop and said he "was going to put (LaRose) in a figure four leg lock."
That was also considered violent speech by the social media site.
Byrnes said he started using X when it was Twitter back in 2009. After years of using it, he became interested in the news and eventually decided to start his blog on Ohio politics.
"I don't consider myself a journalist, but I do consider myself like, a newsman, a news junkie. And that was what has kept me on now," Byrnes said.
Being kicked off X isn't the end of the world for "The Rooster." Byrnes said he gets as much traffic off of BlueSky and also uses TikTok more.
"But at the same, Twitter is just very... it's still unrivaled in that regard and because it has more of the right wing influence and those are who my enemies ultimately are," Byrnes said.
Byrnes said he appealed the ruling, but he doesn't think he will be unbanned from X.
