E107: The Twitter Files Parts 1-2: shadow banning, story suppression, interference & more

Evidence shows that after December 10, 2022, the U.S. federal government (specifically Congress) did make multiple formal attempts to revise Section 230 via new and reintroduced legislation:

• On February 28, 2023, Senators Mark Warner and others reintroduced the SAFE TECH Act, explicitly described in Warner’s press release as legislation "to reform Section 230" so that social media companies can be held accountable for harms such as scams, harassment, and violent extremism. (warner.senate.gov)
• The EARN IT Act was reintroduced in the 118th Congress on April 19, 2023; the bill’s description notes that it aims to amend Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act as part of its child-exploitation prevention framework. (en.wikipedia.org)
• On June 14, 2023, Senators Hawley and Blumenthal introduced the No Section 230 Immunity for AI Act; a related bill, S.1993 (118th Congress), was introduced the same day "to waive immunity under section 230" for generative AI, both representing targeted efforts to narrow Section 230 protections. (hawley.senate.gov)
• More recently, in the 119th Congress (2025–2026), Senator John Curtis introduced S.3193, a bill "to amend section 230 of the Communications Act of 1934 to limit liability protection" for certain social media platforms—another explicit attempt to rewrite the scope of Section 230 immunity. (congress.gov)
• Additional bipartisan proposals, such as Graham and Durbin’s plan to reintroduce a bill that would sunset Section 230 within two years unless Congress replaces it, further illustrate ongoing federal legislative attempts to overhaul or effectively rewrite Section 230. (theverge.com)

Given that the prediction only required that the U.S. federal government would make an attempt to rewrite Section 230 in the near future after December 10, 2022, and that multiple concrete post‑2022 bills were introduced in Congress specifically to reform, amend, narrow, or sunset Section 230, the prediction is best judged as right.

Donald Trump did in fact win the 2024 Republican presidential primary and became the GOP nominee. He secured a majority of delegates by March 2024 and was formally nominated at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in July 2024, confirming that he won the primary contest and became the party’s standard-bearer for the 2024 U.S. presidential election.[¹][²]

Therefore, Jason’s prediction that “Trump’s going to win the primary” was correct.

[¹] News and election coverage confirming Trump clinched the necessary delegates to become the presumptive 2024 GOP nominee. [²] Coverage of the July 2024 Republican National Convention documenting Trump’s formal nomination as the Republican candidate for president.

This prediction concerns China’s population in the year 2100. As of today (November 30, 2025), that year has not occurred, so it is impossible to determine whether the prediction has come true.

We do have long‑range demographic projections suggesting large declines in China’s population by 2100—many major forecasts now project China falling well below 1 billion, and some scenario ranges can go down toward roughly half of its peak. However, these are still projections, not outcomes, and demographic forecasts over ~75 years carry significant uncertainty due to possible changes in fertility policy, migration, mortality, and economic conditions.

Because the target year (2100) is still in the future, the correctness of the statement that China will have “about 600 million people” by then cannot yet be evaluated. Therefore the only defensible status is: too early to tell.

The prediction explicitly covers a 50‑year window (about 2022–2072), so as of November 2025 only ~3 years have passed—far too early to determine whether the Chinese state will become “much, much more actively involved” over the full period.

Early evidence does show Beijing increasing its role in supporting an aging society: the State Council has released a comprehensive “silver economy” strategy with 26 guidelines to reshape healthcare, finance, and technology around older adults; the sector is targeted to grow from about 7 trillion yuan to 30 trillion yuan by 2035, implying substantial policy and fiscal support. (time.com) The government is also stepping up direct elderly‑care initiatives—expanding home‑based and institutional care, subsidizing meal programs and in‑home care beds, and planning broader measures to protect seniors’ rights and participation. (english.www.gov.cn) In parallel, officials have signaled plans to significantly expand and strengthen the National Social Security Fund to cope with hundreds of millions of upcoming retirements, underscoring a more interventionist approach to pensions and long‑term support. (reuters.com) Recent policies also include large and rapidly growing central funding for pension and welfare services and new tax incentives for elder‑care providers. (english.scio.gov.cn)

These developments are directionally consistent with Chamath’s forecast of greater state involvement, but they represent only the initial phase of a 50‑year horizon. We cannot yet know whether this will amount to being “much, much more actively involved” over the entire period compared with 2022, so the prediction’s ultimate accuracy remains inconclusive at this time.

Only about three years have elapsed since the 2022 timestamp of the prediction, which was explicitly about a multi‑decade boom. That horizon (20–30+ years) is far too long to judge based on such a short initial slice of data, so the forecast cannot yet be classed as right or wrong.

India:

• India has indeed been one of the fastest‑growing major economies since 2022, with real GDP growth around 7–8% in 2022–23 and the IMF projecting growth of about 6.5–7% in 2024–25 and 2025–26, keeping it near the top of global growth tables. (imf.org)
• Demographically, India now has the world’s largest population, a median age around 28, and more than half of its people under 30, with its demographic dividend expected to last into the 2050s. (economy-finance.ec.europa.eu) Large cohorts of young workers are entering the labour force each year (on the order of 10–12 million), and multiple analyses highlight that this young, relatively low‑wage workforce is a major driver of India’s attractiveness in global manufacturing and services. (medium.com)
• At the same time, India faces serious constraints—high youth unemployment, a very large informal sector, low female labour‑force participation, and significant skills gaps—which analysts warn could turn the demographic “dividend” into a missed opportunity if not addressed. (indiatoday.in) These uncertainties make it impossible to know yet whether today’s strong growth will become a multi‑decade boom.

Nigeria:

• Nigeria has an even younger demographic profile, with a median age around 18, more than half of the population under 30, and roughly 3.5 million young people entering the labour market each year—one of the largest youth waves in the world. (weforum.org) Demographers project Nigeria’s working‑age population to expand by over 100 million people in about 25 years, creating substantial potential for a demographic dividend, but also a risk of a demographic “bomb” if jobs and skills do not keep pace. (futures.issafrica.org)
• Recent economic performance has been modest rather than “boom‑like”: real GDP growth has been around 3–3.4% in 2023–24, with per‑capita income stagnating and very high inflation. (imf.org) Due largely to naira devaluations, Nigeria has slipped from Africa’s largest economy to about the fourth‑largest in dollar terms. (nairametrics.com)
• International institutions highlight high youth unemployment and underemployment and warn that, without major improvements in education, skills, and job creation, Nigeria may not fully benefit from its demographic wave for decades. (weforum.org) That means the conditions Chamath referenced (a very young, low‑wage workforce) are present, but there is no clear evidence yet of the kind of sustained, rapid growth normally described as a multi‑decade boom.

Overall:

• The core factual premise of the prediction—that India and Nigeria have large cohorts of people in their 20s entering the workforce at comparatively low wages—is well supported by current data. (economy-finance.ec.europa.eu)
• However, whether this will translate into a multi‑decade economic boom for both countries cannot be determined from only a few early years of mixed economic results. India currently looks more consistent with the beginning of such a trajectory than Nigeria, but the long‑run outcome for either country remains uncertain.

Given the very long time horizon of the claim and the limited elapsed time since 2022, the correct assessment as of November 2025 is that the prediction is too early to call.

As of November 2025 it is too early to decisively judge a prediction framed as happening “over the coming decades after 2022.” Only about three years have elapsed, and long‑run demographic effects on GDP, living standards, and political expectations typically play out over 10–30 years.

India:

• Real GDP growth has been strong: IMF data show India growing about 7–8% in 2022–23 and projected around 6.5% in 2024/25 and 2025/26, keeping it among the fastest‑growing major economies. (imf.org)
• The World Bank notes that since 2000 the economy has nearly quadrupled in real terms and that extreme poverty fell from roughly 16.2% in 2011–12 to about 2.3% in 2022–23 (with other World Bank updates citing ~5.3% using a higher poverty line), implying large gains in material living standards. (worldbank.org)
• This is broadly consistent with the “rising GDP” and “rising expectations of living quality” parts of the prediction for India, though most of this trend predates 2022 and cannot yet be attributed specifically to post‑2022 demographics.

Nigeria:

• Nigeria’s GDP has grown modestly: IMF and World Bank reports show real growth around 2.9% in 2023 and about 3.4% in 2024 (the fastest since 2014, excluding the immediate post‑COVID rebound), with projections in the mid‑3% range and some improvement in fiscal and external indicators. (imf.org)
• However, living standards have not clearly risen. World Bank and other analyses indicate poverty has increased: more than half of Nigerians are now below the national poverty line, with estimates of roughly 46–56% poor, and Nigeria accounts for around 15% of the world’s extreme poor. High inflation—especially food inflation—has produced a severe cost‑of‑living crisis. (vanguardngr.com)
• These outcomes cut against the near‑term idea of “rising standards of living” in Nigeria, even if GDP itself is growing.

Expectations of government performance:

• Quantifying “rising expectations” is difficult. There is circumstantial evidence: mass protests in Nigeria in 2024 under the #EndBadGovernance banner, driven by dissatisfaction with economic hardship and governance, suggest strong and possibly rising demands on the state. (en.wikipedia.org) In India, official discourse explicitly acknowledges that public expectations for efficient, transparent service delivery are rising. (business-standard.com) But these indicators are qualitative and too short‑run to establish a decades‑long structural trend.

Overall assessment:

• For India, early‑2020s data are broadly in line with Chamath’s narrative (rising GDP and improved living standards, with growing demands on government), though these trends long predate 2022 and may arise from many factors besides demographics.
• For Nigeria, GDP is improving but poverty and cost‑of‑living pressures have worsened, so the living‑standards component is not yet validated.
• Because (1) the forecast explicitly concerns “coming decades”, and (2) the evidence since 2022 is mixed—especially for Nigeria—it is too early to say whether the prediction will ultimately be right or wrong.

Hence the appropriate verdict is inconclusive (too early) rather than right, wrong, or permanently ambiguous.

Jason’s claim has two main parts: (1) Japan will have a “contraction, constricting economy” driven by demographics, and (2) Japan’s place in the world will become very different from its historical role.

What has happened since December 2022?

Demographics: Japan’s population has continued to shrink and age. Government data show the population fell for the 13th and 14th straight years in 2023 and 2024, with a record natural decline (births minus deaths) and over‑75s now exceeding 20 million and continuing to rise.(nippon.com) Long‑term projections still foresee a drop from about 124 million today to around 87 million by 2070.(apnews.com) This clearly supports the premise of severe demographic headwinds, but that premise was already well known before the prediction.

Economy: Japan has had episodes of weakness, including a technical recession in late 2023 and the loss of its status as the world’s third‑largest economy to Germany.(cnbc.com) Yet over the period 2023–2025, real GDP growth has been low but mostly positive (around 1.5% in 2023, an estimated 0.1% in 2024, and a projected 1.2% in 2025).(imf.org) IMF projections out to 2030 show modest but positive growth (~0.5–0.8% a year), not a clearly contracting economy.

World standing: Japan’s relative economic weight has been drifting downward for decades; its share of world nominal GDP has fallen from about 18% in 1995 to around 4% in the early 2020s, and it is now the fourth‑largest economy.(asahi.com) That said, Japan remains a G7 country, a key U.S. ally, and a major technological and financial power. Its role is evolving gradually, not yet "very, very different" in a clearly decisive way.

Assessment

Three years is far too short to judge a broad, long‑term structural prediction about demographic-driven economic contraction and a fundamentally changed global role. Demographic pressures and some relative decline are evident, but the overall economy has not yet entered a clear long‑run contraction, and Japan’s international standing remains broadly similar in kind. The correct classification today is therefore “inconclusive (too early)”, not definitively right or wrong.

Joe Manchin, then a Democratic U.S. senator from West Virginia, announced he would not seek re‑election to his Senate seat in the 2024 cycle, effectively retiring from that seat.(en.wikipedia.org) In the subsequent 2024 United States Senate election in West Virginia, Republican Governor Jim Justice won the open-seat race with about 68.8% of the vote to Democrat Glenn Elliott’s 27.8%, and he succeeded Manchin in the U.S. Senate.(en.wikipedia.org) Justice, a Republican, was sworn in as senator in January 2025, giving the Republican Party control of the seat Manchin had held.(en.wikipedia.org)

Therefore, the prediction that when Manchin retired his West Virginia Senate seat would go to the Republican Party was borne out by the 2024 election results.