By Dawn Chmielewski and Hyunjoo Jin

April 27 (Reuters) - Elon Musk's criticism of Twitter Inc sparked a barrage of abusive tweets against the company's top lawyer on Wednesday, raising questions about his compliance with a non-disparagement agreement and the tone that the social media platform's incoming owner will set for its users.

Musk tweeted he disagreed with a decision Twitter made in 2020 to restrict the distribution of a New York Post article about U.S. President Joe Biden's son, Hunter. The billionaire, who has about 87 million Twitter followers, called the company's decision to lock the Post's account on the platform "incredibly inappropriate."

Musk, who on Monday reached a deal to acquire Twitter for $44 billion, was responding to a tweet by a podcast host Saagar Enjeti about Vijaya Gadde, the executive who oversees Twitter's policy and legal teams.

Enjeti described Gadde as "the top censorship advocate at Twitter who famously gaslit the world on Joe Rogan's podcast and censored the Hunter Biden laptop story." Gadde then became the subject of a wave of personal attacks by Twitter users on the platform.

Twitter's merger agreement with Musk stipulates that Musk can tweet about the deal while it is pending "so long as such Tweets do not disparage the Company or any of its Representatives." There was no indication that Twitter, which inked the deal with Musk after deciding his offer was attractive, would seek to cancel the sale because of his recent criticism.

Representatives for Musk and Twitter did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Gadde could not be reached for comment.

Dick Costolo, a former chief executive of Twitter, criticized Musk for the move. "Bullying is not leadership.. What's going on? You're making an executive at the company you just bought the target of harassment and threats," Costolo tweeted.

Musk then tweeted back at Costolo: "What are talking about? I'm just saying Twitter needs to be politically neutral."

Musk also weighed in on a discussion about Twitter's deputy general counsel, Jim Baker. In response to critical comments made in a tweet by social media personality Mike Chernovich about Baker, Musk responded: "Sounds pretty bad."

Baker did not immediately respond to Reuters' request for comment.

Katie Harbath, a former public policy director at Meta Platform Inc's Facebook who now leads consultancy Anchor Change, said Musk's criticism of Twitter's content moderation raises concerns that he could overrule recommendations from the team charged with setting policy and procedure.