After the mayhem that was seen at the Capitol in the US, Facebook and Twitter had decided to temporarily suspend POTUS Donald Trump¡¯s account.?
However, while Twitter has lifted the suspension under tight scrutiny, Facebook has gone ahead and announced that Trump will be banned from the platform indefinitely on the grounds of inciting violence in the US capital, as claimed by CEO Mark Zuckerberg.?
Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement on his Facebook page, ¡°The shocking events of the last 24 hours clearly demonstrate that President Donald Trump intends to use his remaining time in office to undermine the peaceful and lawful transition of power to his elected successor, Joe Biden. His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the US and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because we judged that their effect -- and likely their intent -- would be to provoke further violence.¡±
He added, ¡°Over the last several years, we have allowed President Trump to use our platform consistent with our own rules, at times removing content or labelling his posts when they violate our policies. We did this because we believe that the public has a right to the broadest possible access to political speech, even controversial speech. But the current context is now fundamentally different, involving the use of our platform to incite violent insurrection against a democratically elected government.¡±
¡°We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great. Therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete."
Yesterday, Twitter lifted the suspension on Donald Trump¡¯s account in around 12 hours. When suspending the account, Twitter issued a statement, where it said that Trump's messages were violations of the platform's rules on civic integrity and that any future violations will result in permanent suspension of the account.
Even Snapchat went ahead and suspended Trump¡¯s account. While YouTube didn¡¯t do anything to the account, it removed a video of Trump where he repeated false claims of the election fraud while even telling the mob, ¡°I love you¡±, which didn¡¯t sit in line with YouTube¡¯s policy barring claims challenging election results.?