Trump’s campaign is asking Facebook to unblock his account as he prepares for the presidency

Former President Donald Trump has officially asked Facebook to follow Twitter’s lead and reinstate his account after the two were blocked following the Jan. 6 riots on Capitol Hill. This request comes at a time when Mr. Trump is preparing for his third presidential bid.

Highlights

• In a letter sent to Facebook’s parent company Meta on Tuesday, Donald Trump’s campaign said the ban “grossly distorts and inhibits public debate,” NBC News reported.
• Mr Trump’s campaign has not threatened legal action but has sought a meeting with the company “to discuss President Trump’s speedy reinstatement on the platform”.
• Facebook blocked Trump’s account on January 7, 2021, and said it would review the decision two years later.
• Facebook declined to comment on the letter and said it would “announce its decision in the coming weeks,” spokesman Andy Stone told Forbes.

On the contrary

Technology watchdog Accountable Tech is advocating Meta’s continued ban on Trump accounts and has launched a poster campaign outside Facebook’s offices in Washington, D.C., Menlo Park, California, and New York. Chief executive Nicole Gill told the Financial Times: “If Facebook looks at what Trump has written over the last few years, it’s clear that he poses a security threat.”

Basic Context

Meta has been indefinitely suspended from Facebook and Instagram after Trump repeatedly used his social media pages to deny the results of the 2020 presidential election and made false claims that the election was “stolen” when his supporters stormed the Capitol. Facebook cited two posts Trump made in deciding to suspend his account on Jan. 6, including statements about a “rigged election” and another post urging protesters to go home, but suggested their actions were justified. “These are the things and events that happen when a great landslide and sacred electoral victory is unceremoniously and brutally taken away,” he said. Twitter reinstated Mr Trump’s account in November under new owner Elon Musk, who has shifted his politics further to the right. Musk’s move came after a public poll in which 51.8% of 15 million voters said Trump should be reinstated. However, Mr. Trump has yet to tweet from this account and has used his Truth Social platform as his social media outlet of choice.

To control

After announcing his 2024 presidential bid on Nov. 15, Mr. Trump announced this week that he will make his first appearance in South Carolina on Jan. 28. Senator Lindsey Graham and Governor Henry McMaster will join him at the Columbia State House, where he is expected to announce his campaign team.

Tangent

Meanwhile, Trump supporters in Congress are preparing to target tech companies for censorship that Republicans say unfairly tilts the political landscape in favor of Democrats. In the first week of the House of Representatives, the Republican-controlled federal government created a special subcommittee on guns. 2020 New York Post article about Hunter Biden, son of then-presidential candidate Joe Biden. An article published weeks before the 2020 presidential election suggested that while Biden was vice president, his son engaged in bribery by meeting with Ukrainian business associates, an allegation Biden has repeatedly denied. The House Oversight Committee, which now includes Trump’s far-right allies Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gosar and Lauren Boebert, also sought testimony from Twitter employees involved in the Hunter Biden decision.

Article translated from US Forbes – Author: Sarah Dorn

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