Twitter has permanently banned the account of US President Trump, @realDonaldTrump. Attempts by the president to circumvent that ban have resulted in Twitter deleted tweets and further bans, such as on @TeamTrump’s campaign account.
The president also started using the official Twitter-reserved @POTUS account, something he normally never did. In those posts, he attacked Twitter and spoke of the idea of setting up his own platform. The tweets there have been removed by Twitter. In addition, the digital director of Trump’s election campaign joined the fray: he changed his profile picture and name to that of Donald Trump and sent his login details to the president by text message. His account is now also suspended.
Twitter said it had “thoroughly checked” the president’s tweets and subsequently imposed a permaban on “the risk of further incitement to violence.” The reason for the tightened enforcement on the president’s account is the storming of the Capitol by pro-Trump protesters, on January 6. Which tweets are involved and what the exact motivations were, explain Twitter in a blog post.
However, it doesn’t seem to just follow the policy; 300 Twitter employees signed a petition in the hours before the decision was made to permanently remove Donald Trump from the platform.
On Facebook’s side, action had already been taken: Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts will be blocked indefinitely, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg reported. Trump won’t be able to use his accounts for at least about the next two weeks, until after his transfer of power to Biden. Alphabet’s new union also calls for to Trump’s ban from YouTube.