UPDATED 22:39 EDT / JANUARY 13 2021

POLICY

YouTube suspends Trump’s channel, Snapchat hands down a permanent ban

After being accused of inciting violence, YouTube has banned President Trump’s channel for at least seven days.

“After review, and in light of concerns about the ongoing potential for violence, we removed new content uploaded to Donald J. Trump’s channel for violating our policies,” YouTube said. “It now has its 1st strike and is temporarily prevented from uploading new content for a *minimum* of 7 days.” The company added that comments on the channel’s videos will be “indefinitely” disabled.

On Tuesday, the channel posted eight videos, although YouTube hasn’t yet expressly said what remarks led to the ban. In one of those videos Trump said, “I think Big Tech has made a terrible mistake,” and in another video, he asks for “peace and for calm,” so it’s not clear at the moment what the transgression was. It’s likely that pressure from civil rights groups asking for a YouTube ban and the ongoing threat of violence in the U.S. was the reason.

The ban is just strike one according to YouTube’s policies, which means it could be back up in a week. If the channel is issued with three strikes, that could mean a permanent ban, although that recently happened to the TalkRadio channel and it was quickly reinstated.

Snap Inc.-owned Snapchat has taken a zero-tolerance approach, today announcing that Trump’s suspension will now be a permanent ban.

“Last week we announced an indefinite suspension of President Trump’s Snapchat account, and have been assessing what long-term action is in the best interest of our Snapchat community,” a Snap spokesperson told the media. “In the interest of public safety, and based on his attempts to spread misinformation, hate speech, and incite violence, which are clear violations of our guidelines, we have made the decision to permanently terminate his account.”

This means the president has been all but purged from social media, with Twitter Inc. permanently banning his accounts shorting after the Capitol Hill invasion where five people lost their lives. Facebook Inc. has suspended his account, although recently said it has no plans to reinstate it any time soon.

Today, in a series of tweets, Twitter Chief Executive Jack Dorsey defended his company’s decision to take down the @realDonaldTrump account. “I believe this was the right decision for Twitter,” he tweeted. “We faced an extraordinary and untenable circumstance, forcing us to focus all of our actions on public safety. Offline harm as a result of online speech is demonstrably real, and what drives our policy and enforcement above all.”

Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr

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