U.S. Senate Candidate Shiva Ayyadurai’s Twitter Account Suspended
File photo of a booth in support of Shiva Ayyadurai, an Indian American entrepreneur who was running against Sen. Elizabeth Warren, displaying a ‘Photoshopped’ image of Warren wearing a Native American headdress inside the Conservative Political Action Conference Hub at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center Feb. 23, 2018 in National Harbor, Maryland. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
India-West Staff Reporter
Shiva Ayyadurai, an Indian American Republican U.S. Senate candidate in Massachusetts, has had his Twitter account suspended by the social media giant.
According to various media reports, the Belmont resident and self-proclaimed creator of the email had his profile @va_shiva suspended for a violation of Twitter rules, his profile page read Feb. 4.
His entire timeline of tweets and photos are gone, the reports noted.
Twitter did not specify why his account was suspended. Ayyadurai, who ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in 2018 and again in 2020, said he believes it is because he tweeted about Secretary of State William Galvin and Michelle Tassinari, the state’s director of elections, reports said.
“Twitter was coerced by the Government – Secretary of State Galvin and State Election Director Tassinari because I exposed TASSINARI violated Federal Law by deleting ballot images,” Ayyadurai said in an email to local media outlets.
“[It] forced Twitter to do this. Only the Secretary of State can & must restore my Twitter account; otherwise, we live in Putin’s Russia or Communist China,” the email continued.
Ayyadurai accused Tassinari of deleting a million electronic ballots during the 2020 Massachusetts primary and general election and filed a lawsuit against Galvin and Tassinari to that effect late last year. Galvin and Tassinari have denied the claim, noting the state’s ballots are paper, the reports said.
Ayyadurai has been accused of using social media to spread misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic, including posting the virus has been spread by the “deep state” and can be treated with vitamin C. He accused Dr. Anthony Fauci of being a “Deep State Plant” and called for him to be fired, it said.
Ayyadurai was born in India. He holds four degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, including a Ph.D. in biological engineering.
In his 2018 campaign against Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Ayyadurai appeared in a livestream with Matthew Colligan, who was photographed holding a torch and marching in the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, which has been widely condemned as supporting white supremacy.
His campaign slogan in 2018 was “Only a real Indian can defeat a fake Indian,” a reference to Warren’s claim she is of Cherokee descent, the reports noted.
