Twitter’s billionaire owner Elon Musk has ordered the social media platform to remove a badge showing verified status for The New York Times, after the paper’s editors refused to pay for its Twitter Blue service. This comes after Twitter instituted a pay-for-play system in which companies, nonprofits and government institutions have to pay $1,000 a month to keep checkmarks showing their accounts have been verified. So far only a few dozen accounts have seen their badges removed; Musk signaled he’d removed the Times’s checkmark over its coverage, which he blasted in a tweet as “propaganda.” Other prominent accounts — reportedly including those of White House staffers — have refused to pay for Twitter Blue. That’s led to fears over misinformation and hate speech by imposter accounts on Twitter ahead of the 2024 presidential elections.