X to pay legal bills for doctor warned over COVID tweets

Elon Musk's X said it's funding legal bills for a Canadian doctor previously chastised by regulators for her tweets about COVID-19.

In a post to the X News account on Sunday morning, the company formerly known as Twitter wrote that it's "proud to defend" Dr. Kulvinder Kaur Gill against what it calls "government-supported efforts to cancel her speech."

In 2021, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) cautioned the Brampton, Ont.-based pediatrics specialist over her tweets, including one saying vaccination for COVID-19 was unnecessary.

The doctorhas an ongoing crowdfunding campaign asking for $300,000 to help pay for legal costs, including a cost order related to a lawsuit she launched against what she called a "malicious online smear campaign."

On March 17, Gill tagged Musk in a post asking him for help, saying she owedcosts that were due in four days.

"It's $300,000 I don't have, after nearly four years of being entangled in multiple legal battles trying to advocate for my patients,"Gill said in thevideo. "It's now looking quite grim."

Gill then issued another video post on X on Thursday, saying Musk has committed to paying the remainder of her crowdfunding campaign and helping her appeal the College's cautions from 2021 "til the very end."

"May Wahegurualways bless you, Elon," she said, using the Sikh term for God.

Publicly available legal filings show that Gill previously launched a lawsuit against 23 defendants. The claim was dismissed, awarding costs to the defendants totalling more than $1.1 million.

LISTEN |Why Elon Musk's X is paying for the legal bills of a Brampton doctor who tweeted against COVID vaccines:

Metro Morning7:39Why Elon Musk's X is paying for the legal bills of a Brampton doctor who tweeted against COVID vaccines

Kerry Bowman is a bioethicist at University of Toronto.  

Gill appealed the dismissal, though only regarding her claim against four of the defendants, and sought leave to appeal the related costs orders. The appeal was dismissed, and she was refused leave to appeal the costs orders.

Last August, Musk posted on X promising to fund the legal bills of anyone who was "unfairly treated" by their employers "due to posting or liking something on this platform."

"No limit," he wrote.

University of Toronto bioethicist Kerry BowmantoldCBC Radio'sMetro Morning thatMusk is "pretty selective about what kind of freedom of speech he will fight for."

Gill's case is not justabout freedom of speechbut about her responsibility as a physician,hesaid, adding that a physiciansaying vaccination for COVID-19 wasunnecessary can cause"a lot of social harm in a crisis."

"When you have a physician, emphasis on physician, saying this, credibility erodes very, very quickly," Bowman said. "People will say this is controversial because a physician says vaccines don't work."

It's been almost a year and a half since Musk bought Twitter for US$44 billion, taking the formerly publicly traded company private.

He has since renamed the platform X and made sweeping changes, including dismantling its verification systemand getting rid of the majority of the workforce including engineers and moderators.

Experts have raised concern about the amount of misinformation being posted and algorithmically promoted on X, including about topics like the Israel-Hamas war.