Facebook has extended former President Donald Trump’s suspension for two years and says it will only reinstate him “if the risk to public safety has receded.”The decision comes after Facebook’s Oversight Board told the company it had been wrong to impose an indefinite ban on Trump after the Jan.6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Facebook says it is setting new rules for public figures in times of civil unrest and violence, “to be applied in exceptional cases such as this.” Trump has received the maximum penalty under those rules, “given the gravity of the circumstances” leading to his suspension. Because the company took his Facebook and Instagram account down on Jan. 7, the two-year suspension will last until at least Jan. 7, 2023.
Facebook will consult experts and “evaluate external factors, including instances of violence, restrictions on peaceful assembly and other markers of civil unrest,” said Nick Clegg, vice president of global affairs, in a statement.
Facebook’s decision was also derided by left-leaning civil rights and tech watchdog groups who hoped it would permanently ban Trump. This decision only goes to underline the enormous, unchecked power of Facebook and its repeated failure to police its platform,” a coalition calling itself the Real Facebook Oversight Board.
Donald Trump and his allies used Facebook to incite an insurrection and attempted coup of the United States Government. The punishment: Back on Facebook just in time for Trump 2024, with no explanation at all why a two-year ban, or what the criteria are for determining his status when the ban expires.
Facebook is overhauling a key part of its approach and will no longer consider politicians’ posts “newsworthy” by default. That means if politicians break the company’s rules prohibiting harmful speech, they will face the same consequences as any other user.
The policy changes were announced Friday in response to recommendations from Facebook’s Oversight Board.
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