Tech company Meta will reactivate former US President Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts “in the coming weeks” after a two-year suspension, Global Affairs president Nick Clegg said.
The information was passed on to the American news site Axios.
“We’ve always believed that Americans should be able to listen to the people who want to run the country. We don’t want to get in the way of that,” Clegg said.
The decision sets a new precedent for how the Meta exposes world leaders, potentially affecting the 2024 US presidential election.
Facebook, like other social networks, has suspended Trump after the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 for breaking the rules and inciting violence.
“We just don’t want – if he returns to our services – for him to do what he did on Jan. [de 2021]i.e. using our services to declare the 2024 election illegal, just as you tried to discredit the 2020 election,” said the former British deputy prime minister.
Trump accounts won’t be immediately responsive, however, as Meta engineers need time to develop a new functionality needed to restrict certain publishing or advertising features in the future if needed.
Trump will be subject to new policies on limiting the bills of public figures during civic demonstrations. Meta may suspend the account of a public figure who violates our community guidelines for a period of one month to two years.
More serious violations warrant a restriction on content creation for six or 12 months, or a full account restriction for two years, if severe.
“Now if he posts more infringing content, that content will of course be removed and he could be suspended from one month to two years, depending on the severity of the infringement,” Clegg said.
The president of Global Affairs also said the company will have the power to act and impose various types of protections, including restricting the distribution of publications if it removes them or temporarily suspending access to its advertising tools.
“Indirect references to QAnon content, for example,” he noted.
Clegg said Meta did not speak to Trump or any of his representatives before making the decision and does not know if the former US president plans to use the accounts after they are reactivated.
“The company will always be available to explain and emphasize the policies we have established. (…) I think it would help if Donald Trump’s team were as knowledgeable as possible about where those boundaries are being drawn and how those barriers go to work,” he said. Clegg.
The reactivation of Trumo’s accounts will allow it to share information again through its Facebook and Instagram pages, which have 34 million and 23 million followers respectively.
Donald Trump was reinstated on Twitter on November 19, 2022, four days after he ran for president in 2024, but has not made any publications yet.
Last week, the former head of state had officially asked to return to Facebook.
Attorney Scott Gast sent a letter to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg asking him to “meet to discuss the early takeover” on that social network.
“We believe that the suspension of President Trump’s Facebook account has radically distorted and limited public debate,” the Jan. 17 letter reads.
Source: DN
