Kathy Griffin's Twitter account gets suspended, Elon Musk cheekily mocks the comedian

The Twitter account of Kathy Griffin, the American comedian and actress, was suspended on Sunday, making her the most recent subject of Elon Musk's Twitter takeover. After changing her display name to Musk, 62-year-old Griffin appeared to be immediately banned from the social media platform. Even though her account name showed “@kathygriffin”, the screen name appeared as ‘Elon Musk’ beside the verified tick mark. Benny Johnson, who is the host of The Benny Report, took to Twitter to announce the account suspension of Kathy Griffin.  

Following Johnson’s tweet, the new Twitter owner Elon Musk replied, “Actually, she was suspended for impersonating a comedian.” He added, “But if she really wants her account back, she can have it” for $8. Although he does not directly state she is not funny, he implied that she has been banned for impersonating a comedian, indicating that Griffin, who is a comedian, is not funny.

According to a report from Vulture, Griffin had changed her name to Elon Musk on the platform, and she was tweeting as Musk pleading with people to support Democrats in the upcoming midterm elections.  

Elon Musk announced 'comedy is now legal on Twitter'

Just over a week after announcing that "comedy is now legal on Twitter" and promising to establish the platform as a safe place of "free speech," Musk said that "impersonation" will no longer be tolerated. It is pertinent to mention that the world's richest man announced a new policy on November 6 that Twitter will suspend accounts engaging in any form of "impersonation" that comedians and others have been using as a way to satirically protest his acquisition of the microblogging platform in recent days. 

In addition to this, the social media platform's new owner said on Sunday that any Twitter accounts that impersonate others would have their accounts permanently banned.  

In reaction to the billionaire's proposal to charge verified users $8 per month, several celebrities changed their Twitter display names but not their account names and posted as "Elon Musk." Musk brought this up in a tweet by stating that "Going forward, any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying “parody” will be permanently suspended”.     

Musk then tweeted, "Previously, we issued a warning before the suspension, but now that we are rolling out widespread verification, there will be no warning. This will be clearly identified as a condition for signing up to Twitter Blue." 

Besides Kathy Griffin, another prominent Twitter user, Valerie Bertinelli, also experimented with changing her display name to Elon Musk, but on Sunday she returned to using her real name. She tweeted, "Okey-dokey I’ve had my fun and I think I made my point." 

Meanwhile, Musk intends to compel all Twitter users to join Twitter Blue, which will cost each person $8 a month, in order to enable Twitter verification for all users.