As social media platforms go, Twitter is unquestionably one of the big ones — with between 370 million and 450 million monthly active users.

It’s been the subject of countless news stories of late, between the Twitter Files, and Wednesday’s hearing on Capitol Hill before the House Oversight Committee.

Late Wednesday afternoon, however, the site appeared to suffer a widespread outage. Users attempting to tweet began receiving messages that they were over their daily-allotted tweet limit.

#TwitterDown I can only tweet this if I schedule it a minute out. pic.twitter.com/9tquSF6TRd

— Is Your Love True-sieQ 💘💗💝 (@SmoosieQ) February 8, 2023

Before too long, however, users discovered tweets would send if scheduled. As of 6:00 pm Eastern, the site still appears to be largely down (aside from scheduled tweets) — though there were signs the platform might be coming back to life just as this article went to publication.

Surely, it’s just a coincidence that the site went down on the same day several of its former executives were testifying before Congress? And that the hearing room lost power right in the middle of the hearing?

A House Oversight Committee hearing meant to put former Twitter executives and their actions under a spotlight, but the room suddenly went dark in the middle of the questioning.

A power outage brought the hearing to a halt while Rep. Gary Palmer, R-Ala., was asking questions about how Twitter allowed supporters of terror to use the social media platform to promote their agendas. Palmer noted that Twitter banned former President Donald Trump after an examination of his tweets and how they were interpreted, yet they continued to allow Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to use Twitter.

As the congressman uttered the words, “Ayatollah Khameini,” the room went dark.

“Did Twitter do that?” someone could be heard asking.

Surely.

Update – 6:42 pm Eastern – It’s not just Twitter.

BREAKING: Massive outages reported across multiple websites and apps — it’s not just Twitter pic.twitter.com/BSXzSP4U6c

— ALX 🇺🇸 (@alx) February 8, 2023