Donald Trump is coming back. Initially, however, probably only to Instagram and Facebook. The parent company behind the two social media platforms has announced that it wants to lift the ban imposed on the former US President years ago.
The Internet company Meta Platforms, formerly better known as Facebook, which is behind the social media services Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram, has announced that it wants to give former US President and highly controversial real estate marketer Donald Trump the opportunity to be active on the company’s platforms.
Facebook, Instagram, and several other social media services immediately blocked Trump after thousands of right-wing extremists attacked the US Capitol in Washington, DC, in January 2021. The background was feared that he could call on and incite his followers to violence via the platforms. The US authorities are still investigating Trump, accusing him of an attack on the heart of US politics after he lost the election to current US President Joe Biden.
Meta had set up an internal commission to deal with decisions about the content available on the platform. This recently decided that Trump would remain blocked on Facebook and Instagram until at least January 7, 2023. However, Meta has always said it will not impose an “indefinite” ban on Trump.
In a blog post, Nick Clegg, Meta’s President of Global Affairs, explained that after extensive consultations with unspecified experts, it was concluded that the risk had now decreased significantly. They, therefore, want to stick to the period of about two years set at the beginning of the blocking and now release Trump’s accounts “in the coming weeks”.
Trump, who says he wants to run again as a candidate for the US presidency in 2024, must expect that Meta will control his profiles more closely in the future. According to Clegg, they want to introduce new “guard rails” without giving exact details. In addition, Trump was threatened with harsher penalties in the future if Instagram and Facebook guidelines were violated again.
Donald Trump’s user accounts currently have 23.3 million followers on Instagram and 34 million followers on Facebook. Trump is currently followed by around 4.78 million people on the “alternative” social network Truth Social, which he runs himself. On Twitter, where Trump after taking over the platform Elon Musk took over the platform hasn’t been officially blocked since November, he has almost 88 million followers but hasn’t published any new postings there for a long time.
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