Meta frees Donald Trump to return to Instagram and Facebook
On Tuesday (25), Meta announced that it has put an end to the suspension of the accounts of former U.S. President Donald Trump, both on Instagram and Facebook. In the coming weeks, the company will reinstate the politician’s accounts on both platforms, adhering to new protection rules that prevent the recidivism of the infringement.
Donald Trump had his accounts suspended indefinitely from Instagram and Facebook in early 2021, shortly after he praised the invasion that took place on Capitol Hill on January 6.
At the time, the measure was supported by the Meta Supervisory Board, an independent entity that helps verify the decisions taken by the company. Despite the support, the Council warned of the lack of clear criteria set out in the platforms for this type of situation and pointed to how drastic the open nature of the decision was, without a set time of suspension.
Given this, The Goal decided to put a two-year withdrawal period for the former president’s accounts, clarify better its rules for these circumstances and update its Crisis Policy Protocol.
In addition, the company decided that at the end of the period, they would consider whether or not to reactivate Trump’s accounts, assessing whether the risk to public safety had diminished.
Platform guidelines have been updated
After the two-year period, Meta complied with the agreement and reassessed its decree. According to them, the suspension was an extraordinary decision made in extraordinary circumstances and, in the normal state of things, the public should be able to listen to a former Us President.
“Now that the suspension period has ended, the question is not whether we have chosen to reinstate Mr. Trump’s accounts, but whether there are still such extraordinary circumstances that justify extending the suspension beyond the original two-year period,” he said in his statement.
The verdict, therefore, was to reinstate the politician’s accounts over the next few weeks. Although, to this end, a number of guidelines for the platforms have been updated.
Among the measures adopted is the decision to apply more severe penalties to public figures suspended for issues related to civil disturbances and that are re-involved in these occurrences. Which means that if Trump republishes infringing content, the post will be removed from the social network and he will be suspended for a period of one month to two years, depending on the severity of the incident.
In addition, even content that does not directly violate community rules but presents some kind of risk (such as publications that disemrule an election) will have limited distribution.
In special cases, if the politician publishes any content that violates community standards, but Meta understands that “there is a public interest in Trump’s statement that overcomes any potential damage,” the company can keep posting on the mogul’s profile, only restricted its distribution.
According to Meta, the company is aware that any decision on the withdrawal of the suspension of Trump’s accounts would be criticized during. The company claims, however, that it adopts as standard to let people speak, even when what they have to say is something unpleasant or factually wrong.
“We believe that it is necessary and possible to draw a line between content that is harmful and should be removed and content that, however unpleasant or inaccurate, is part of difficult life in a free society,” he said in his statement.
Also according to the company, its Community Standards policy has been publicly posted exactly so that everyone can understand how they draw this line.
“We want to be as clear as possible now about our policies, so that even in cases where people disagree with us, they still understand the logic of our responses,” he said.
