Facebook Confirms That Trump Is Still Suspended After an Online Frenzy
(pool photo via Getty by Pete Marovich for The New York Times)
Donald Trump’s Facebook suspension has not been lifted.
There was a mild frenzy on Twitter late Wednesday afternoon when some reporters and commentators noticed the former president’s page was up, leading to questions about (and people reaching the conclusion that) his suspension being lifted.
It spread so much on Twitter (as of this posting #DeleteFacebook is among Twitter’s trending topics) that Facebook’s Andy Stone had to publicly clarify that Trump is still banned.
No. Nothing about the status of President Trump's presence on our platform has changed. He remains indefinitely suspended.
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) June 2, 2021
No. Nothing about the status of President Trump's presence on our platform has changed. He remains indefinitely suspended.
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) June 2, 2021
This clarification came on the heels of the former president ending the web page he was using to post statements weighing in on multiple subjects and continuing to push his usual baseless claims about the 2020 election.
Trump was banned indefinitely from Facebook and Instagram on January 7th, one day after the Capitol riots, and Mark Zuckerberg said at the time, “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.”
The Facebook Oversight Board upheld Trump’s ban in May.
